Commentaries:
Adam Clarke
Who only hath immortality - All beings that are not eternal must be mutable; but there can be only one eternal Being, that is God; and he only can have immortality.
Dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto - All this is said by the apostle in three words , inhabiting unapproachable light. Such is the excessive glory of God, that neither angel nor man can approach it. It is indeed equally unapproachable to all created beings.
Whom no man hath seen, nor can see - Moses himself could only see the symbol of the Divine presence; but the face of God no man could ever see. Because he is infinite and eternal, therefore he is incomprehensible; and if incomprehensible to the mind, consequently invisible to the eye.
To whom - As the author of being, and the dispenser of all good, be ascribed honor and power - the sole authority of all-pervading, all-superintending, all-preserving, and everlasting might.
The words of St. Paul are inimitably sublime. It is a doubt whether human language can be carried much higher, even under the influence of inspiration, in a description of the supreme Being. It is well known that St. Paul had read the Greek poets. He quotes Aratus, Epimenides, and Menander; this is allowed on all hands. But does he not quote, or refer to, Aeschylus and Sophocles too? Scarcely any person suspects this; and yet there is such a complete similarity between the following quotations from the above poets and the apostle' s words, that we are almost persuaded he had them in his eye. But if so, he extends the thought infinitely higher, by language incomparably more exalted. I shall introduce and compare with the text the passages I refer to.
I Timothy 6:15
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The supreme Being is also styled the King of kings, and the Blessed, by Aeschylus in his tragedy of the Supplicants: -
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Ver 520. Ed. Porson.
"O King of kings! most Blessed of the blessed! most Perfect of the perfect!"
I Timothy 6:16
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In the Antigone of Sophocles there is a sublime address to Jove, of which the following is an extract:
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Ver. 608. Edit. Brunk.
"But thou, an ever-during Potentate, dost inhabit the refulgent splendor of Olympus!"
This passage is grand and noble; but how insignificant does it appear when contrasted with the superior sublimity of the inspired writer! The deity of Sophocles dwells in the dazzling splendor of heaven; but the God of Paul inhabits light so dazzling and so resplendent that it is perfectly unapproachable!
Synesius, in his third hymn, has a fine idea on the mode of God' s existence, which very probably he borrowed from St. Paul: -
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"O intellectual Being! veiled in thine own effulgence!"
And a few lines after, he says, -
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"Thou art He who art concealed by thy splendors."
All these are excellent, but they are stars of the twelfth magnitude before the apostolic Sun.
See a quotation from Euripides, II Timothy 4:8.
Other Adam Clarke entries containing 1 Timothy 6:16:
Philippians 2:6
1 Timothy 6:16
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