A moral exhortation (3:6-15). The fault reproved here had already been censured by Saint Paul in the first epistle, 1 Thess 4:11 and 1 Thess 5:14. There it is treated more briefly and indulgently, but here more strictly and at greater length. Evidently this old vice was common among the Thessalonians before their conversion and was not considered a sin. Therefore they were not quickly corrected.
Yet it was obvious and conspicuous, so that Saint Paul noticed it during his first stay in Thessalonica. Even then he gave the necessary commandments and admonitions (1 Thess 4:11; 2 Thess 3:10). In confirmation of those instructions, he gave a charge in the first epistle. Since they fell into the same thing again, here in the second epistle he sets apart a whole section of ten verses for reproof.
There he sets forth the ground for the impropriety of the conduct being reproved. He gives a strict command against it and lays down a punishment for the disobedient, if such should appear. The course of thought is this. By imitating me, verses 7-9, and remembering the commandment I personally gave, believers must conduct themselves quietly and live by their own labors, verse 10.
But some among you act otherwise. They do nothing, but only wander here and there, verse 11. I command them to amend, so that by laboring they may eat their own bread. Concerning those who do not obey this word of mine, let me know. Meanwhile have no fellowship with them, verse 14, yet not with hostile feelings, but with a view to correction, verse 15.
The Apostle's desire is plainly to cut short the spread of evil as quickly as possible, or to hasten the correction already begun. For this purpose, with particular insistence, he directs those who are sound in this matter to cease fellowship with the unsound. By this two benefits were gained. The sound were delivered from infection and strengthened more firmly in soundness. The unsound were put to shame.
Besides other motives toward labor, they received a new practical motive from the fact that everyone avoided them for their idleness and made them, within the community, almost like exiles. Considering this measure so powerful, Saint Paul especially insists on it. He mentions it at the beginning of the discourse, verse 6, and at the end, verse 14. He raises it into an immutable law, uttered in the name of the Lord Himself.
Nowhere is it evident that this idleness, this idle and parasitic life, appeared with such force among the Thessalonian Christians because of a false conviction that the day of the Lord had arrived. If this love of idleness had any relation to expectation of the Lord's coming, the Apostle would have marked this in some way. But he gives no indication of it. Rather, it must be supposed that this was a common vice of pagan life.
In populous cities a noisy, merry, idle, dissolute life strikes everyone's eye. Such a life exists even now among us. Were the Apostle to appear in one of our large cities, he would see what he saw among the Thessalonians. He would say to us what he said to them. They do nothing, but only busy themselves, run from one end to another, chase pleasures, and make merry.
It is unseemly for Christians to live so. They should conduct themselves quietly, stay at home, and be occupied with work, so that they may have the consolation of eating their own bread. A life of pleasure and love of idleness is so contrary to the spirit of Christianity. Therefore the Apostle wishes to wean Christians from it, so that not even their trace may remain on these paths of pagan life.
Here the Apostle sets forth a general law for maintaining Christian good conduct. He makes only a slight allusion here to the particular case that will be discussed below. In preaching the Gospel, the Apostles from the beginning established among believers new Christian orders of life. They taught how believers were to conduct themselves in the family, in society, and in the Church.
In the name of the Lord they gave an indispensable law. From anyone who would not live so, separate yourselves. By this a silent judgment and excommunication of the guilty from Christian society took place. When others separated from them, they naturally became separated. It follows that, according to the intentions of the Lord and the holy Apostles, Christian communities in their whole composition must be strict fulfillers of the commandments and blameless in morals.
The preservation of such purity is the concern of the whole community, as though it were the law of self-preservation. "Now we command." Earlier he said, we are confident that you both do and will do what we command you. Now he says, "Now we command you," and shows what it is. He points directly to what preceded. Consequently, that earlier word was spoken with this in view. He applies that confidence, or indicates a case in which they may justify it.
"In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ." The name stands for the person. "In the name" is the same as, by Christ the Lord Himself, or from the face of the Lord Himself, by His authority given to us for the ordering of His kingdom on earth. It is as if he said, "It is not we who say this, but Christ" (Chrysostom). "He legislates this through us" (Theodoret). "For what I say, He says" (Theophylact).
The Apostle speaks thus "either in this sense: let Christ be witness that we have given you such a commandment, or in this sense: the word uttered by me is not mine, but His" (Oecumenius). In every way, the commandment uttered is the direct will of God. It is an immutable law which can neither be evaded nor interpreted crookedly. "By speaking in this way, the Apostle shows with what fear one must regard this commandment" (Chrysostom).
At the same time, he suggests that departure from this commandment will cast a shadow upon the Gospel itself, and as it were upon the Lord Himself. Hence such strictness is used, so that outsiders could not say, see what they teach, see what their faith is, see what their Christ is.
"Withdraw yourselves," that is, "separate yourselves" (Theodoret), "stand aside, depart" (Oecumenius), "turn away" (Chrysostom). Below he says, do not associate with him. But this must be done so as not to regard the unsound man as an enemy, but to admonish him as a brother through such treatment of him, verse 14.
It is evident that this is more than mere withdrawal from participation in his affairs or manner of life. Even that could express the admonition, we do not walk your road, and we do not advise you to do so. Such a thing could act soberingly upon the unsound man. Seeing that his conduct is not encouraged by participation, but reproved by nonparticipation, the brother could come to himself and be corrected.
The Apostle says more. By withdrawing from the disorderly brother, they were to separate him from themselves, so that he would see himself estranged from Christian society. In this lies the whole force of the corrective measure established by the Lord through the Apostles. We shall cite Saint Chrysostom's extended discourse on this below.
"Every brother" means every Christian, insofar as he is a Christian. In the epistle to the Corinthians, the Apostle gives the same command not to associate with various persons of disorderly conduct, but only with persons belonging to the Christian community, that is, with brethren. For, he says, if it were laid down as law to withdraw from all such people, one would have to leave the world (1 Cor 5:10).
"Who walks disorderly," that is, "who lives so" (Chrysostom), "one who lives without any order, not according to the laws of God" (Oecumenius). Judging from the disorder discussed below, those who walk disorderly here are understood as idle wanderers. They do nothing, avoid useful labors, and spend life only in amusements and pleasures. All our God-wise interpreters understand it this way.
Yet nothing prevents us from understanding by such people all violators of the order of Christian life. In general, they are those who do not live according to the tradition received from the Apostles. Everywhere the Apostles established new orders of life, moral, religious, domestic, and civic, and they required their unfailing fulfillment. Violators of these ordinances departed from order and proved disorderly, walking disorderly.
To withdraw from all such and thereby separate them from oneself was the universal apostolic law, which the Apostle mentions in many epistles. Writing to the Romans, for example, he commands them to avoid everyone who causes divisions (Rom 16:17). In the epistle to the Corinthians he enumerates all persons of this kind, saying, "But now I have written to you not to associate with anyone named a brother who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or abusive, or a drunkard, or an extortioner. With such a one do not even eat" (1 Cor 5:11).
How beneficial such a law was then, and how desirable it would be for it to remain in force in our own times, Saint Chrysostom writes at length. "The Apostle wants us to withdraw from every brother who walks disorderly. To be separated from the whole community of brethren was then considered a great calamity. Therefore the Apostle subjects all to this punishment.
"Thus elsewhere, in the epistle to the Corinthians, he said, 'With such a one do not even eat' (1 Cor 5:11). But now the greater part of people regard this as unimportant. Everything has now been merged and thrown into disorder. We enter into fellowship indiscriminately and as it happens with adulterers, fornicators, and covetous people.
"If it was necessary to withdraw from one who, only because of laziness, needs help from others, how much more from the rest? That you may know what fear separation from the fellowship of the brethren inspired, and what benefit it brought to those who accepted such punishment good-heartedly, listen.
"The man who boasted of his sin, who reached the last degree of corruption, who committed fornication not even named among the pagans, and who remained insensible to his wound, for this is the final degree of corruption, was so humbled and tamed that Paul later said of him, 'This punishment by the majority is sufficient for such a one. Therefore confirm your love toward him' (2 Cor 2:6, 8).
"Such a man was then like a member torn from the rest of the body. The reason this inspired such fear then was that it was considered a great good to be in the society of believers. Then in each Church they lived as people dwelling in one house, subject to one father, and sharing one table.
"Therefore removal from such great love was a misfortune for each one. But now this does not seem important, because we also do not consider mutual fellowship important. What formerly was counted among punishments now happens among you not as punishment, but because of the cooling of love. We withdraw from one another out of indifference.
"For the absence of love is the cause of all evils. It has destroyed and abolished everything great and glorious in the Church, namely everything for which one ought to rejoice."
It must be observed that in the words, "not according to the tradition which they received from us," tradition clearly signifies not teaching, but the orders of life established by the Apostles. It embraces all the orders. These orders were received by Christian communities and preserved inviolate under the title of immutable law. From the immediate recipients of these orders, personally from the Apostles, they passed unchanged to their successors.
As the Church came forth from the apostolic age, so she was formed directly by the holy Apostles. Teaching was given by word and confirmed, where necessary, by writing. Orders were established in practice, through direct arrangements, though they were sometimes mentioned in the epistles. In the present passage, tradition means what was factual, introduced into life by deed. Theodoret writes, "Tradition is understood not in words, but in deeds."
THEOSIS