I PETER 4:17-18

In this chapter concentrating on the subject of suffering (see verses 1a, 1b, 12, 13, 15, 16, 19) and judgment (vv. 5, 6, and 17), there is the interesting passage of verses 17-18 in which Peter expresses his thoughts in v. 17b, which turn out to be a slight paraphrase of Proverbs 11:31 LXX (i.e., the Greek Septuagint version), as given in v. 18. Allen Ross points out that this is one of ten times that a quotation from Proverbs appears in the NT. The similarity between the two passages can be seen below:

    “If it [judgment] begins with us,

                what will be the end for those who do not obey the gospel of God?” (17b)

    “If it is hard for the righteous to be saved,

                what will become of the ungodly and the sinners?” (18)

And for comparison sake, here is the sort of parallelism present in the original Proverbs saying:

    “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life,

                but violence takes lives away.” (30)

    “If the righteous are repaid on earth,

                How much more the wicked and sinner!” (31)

As Goppelt puts it, “This passage [i.e. v. 18] says for the author in different words what he himself has formulated in v. 17b. The parallelism between vv. 17b and 18 makes clear how the author intended that his OT quotations be understood.. He views these OT expressions from the perspective of the gospel, but he wants, thereby, to let them express precisely their original intention. Therefore, 'the just one' is, in accordance with the OT, one who does justice to his or her relationship to God This happens in the OT through conduct in accord with the covenant of law, here through a life in accord with the gospel, i.e., speech and deed on the basis of faith (cf. 3:12).

Whenever I encounter a place in the NT in which an OT passage is quoted or alluded to, the first resource I turn to is generally Beale and Carson's Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament. There I found the following comments by Carson:

“In words largely borrowed from Ezek. 9:5-6; Zech. 13:9; and Mal. 3:1-3, Peter in 4:17 insists that it is time for judgment to begin at God's household. The context of 1 Pet. 4, however, shows that this is referring to what his Christian readers are currently suffering at the hands of pagan oppressors. Their suffering is unjust. So how can this be thought of as in any sense a mark of God's eschatological judgment, which is what Ezekiel, Zechariah, and Malachi have in mind? For that judgment is utterly just, and if it brings punishment, such punishment is deserved. Could Peter really be saying that his Christian readers actually deserve the oppression that they are forced to endure at the hands of pagans?”

Carson's solution to this problem is to posit that it is not eternal judgment which is in mind here, but instead a period of testing for believers not at all the same as the sort of punishment in mind for those who do not obey God's will. He concludes: “To say that salvation is difficult for the righteous is not to say that God finds it terribly difficult to save them (though one should never downplay the cost of the atonement) but rather that God's people, in line with Jesus' own instruction, enter the narrow gate (Luke 13:23-24) and face opposition of the world from which they have sprung (cf. Matt. 10; Mark 13:20). Implicitly this is a challenge to Peter's readers to follow through to the end, to persevere to the end...It is difficult to overestimate the importance, especially in the NT, of establishing one's priorities on the basis of an eternal perspective that never forgets that God is the final judge.”

Raymer says, “The vicissitudes of life are a part of God's constant care, yet from a human perspective discipline is always 'hard.' Peter is not teaching that salvation is earned through personal trials or works, but simply that those who are saved are not exempt from temporal disciplinary judgments which are the natural consequences of sin. The writer of Hebrews also supports Peter: 'Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons' (Heb. 12:7).”

“The concept that judgment begins with the family of God derives from such passages as Am. 3:2; Jer. 7:8-15; 25:29f.; Ezek. 9:6. It implies that the persecutions and afflictions of Christians are part of the displeasure of God at sin, but they come upon them rather to refine away the evil than to condemn (cf. 1:6f.). Similar teaching is found in Jn 15:2; I C. 11:31f.; 2 Th. 1:3-8.” (Polkinghorne)

I like Eugene Boring's perspective on these verses: “The temptation of a minority religious community suffering harassment and discrimination is to demonize its opponents and to assume a stance of self-righteous indignation that excludes itself from the judgment of God. First Peter resists that temptation, adopting the Old Testament view that election is not for privilege but for responsibility (Amos 32), that to belong to the elect and holy people of God does not mean exclusion from God's judgment which begins at the house of God

And Reicke states that the “ill will of the heathen toward the Christians in reality shows that the last judgment has already begun, vs. 17a. For the current slander and suspicion are only anticipatory of the judgment as it pertains to the Christians. The judgment is to begin with God's house the church, but the final judgment of the opponents will be much worse, vs. 17b...it is further stated in vs. 18 that the severity of the divine judge toward the righteous indicates that the godless must soon face a far sterner punishment. Here the reader might well think of Jesus' words about the narrow and the broad ways (Matt vii 13), and the comparison between the green and the dry tree (Luke xxiii 31).”

“While God's coming to possess His people is assured, it cannot be realized without preparatory judgment and purification. A prophetic indication of this prior necessity is given in Ezk. ix (especially verse 6) and Mal. iii. 1-6, 17, 18, iv. 1. The same prophets also make plain that, after God has thus delivered His people by judgment, and made them fit for His presence, He will deal with sinners in judgment to destroy them from before His face, to banish them to outer darkness, to give them no more standing in His sight....Peter thus repeats with a new emphasis truths stressed before, namely, that those who share in God's judgment on sin here will find salvation hereafter, whereas those who live here in ungodliness and sin must face terrifying final judgment hereafter. While there are brevity and reserve in what he says, it at least suggests that, in so far as those who become Christians need purgatorial cleansing before they can share the heavenly glory, it is meted out to them , not in some intermediate state, but in this life.” (Stibbs)

Keener: “Some see the judgment in 4:17 in terms of expected end-time suffering before the Lord's coming...But whether Peter thinks of a final tribulation here or not (and as far as Peter knows, any near tribulation may be the final one), he can draw on the familiar understanding of end-time sufferings for the righteous... In this case, we may think of the sort of prophetic rhetoric that appears often in OT prophets, in which nearer judgments foreshadow a more ultimate day of the Lord (cf., e.g., Isa. 13:1, 6, 9-13; 34:2-6; Joel 1:15; 2:1, 25)...Peter reinforces the point of 4:17 with a verbatim quotation of 4:18 ...In the context of 1 Peter, the difficulty with being saved seems to be the suffering they endure (4:16-17), which requires perseverance in the face of hardship (2:20; 5:8-10). If God's own people suffer now, how much more can we expect God to punish the wicked?”

Concerning Proverbs 11:31 itself, Waltke writes: “The section on payments is drawn to a conclusion with a climactic assertion that crime does not pay...This is the first time the form of climax (i.e. how much more!) occurs. If (hen) presents the premise in verset A to the conclusion introduced by 'how much more' in the B verset, an a fortiori argument from the lesser to the greater...Here it functions as a legal term to denote achieving compensation and satisfaction for damages...the phrase ['in the earth'] denotes the historical realm, the sphere of humanity's time and space, where the principle of divine justice is worked out for the righteous...The verset [i.e. B] probably implies a distinction between the present remedial punishment of the righteous 'in the earth' and the future penal punishment of the wicked, the theme of this section. The preceding proverbs leave no doubt that their eternal death is in view.”