2 Corinthians 1:10

Who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver: in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us;

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(10) Who delivered us from so great a death.—Death in itself seems hardly to admit of such a qualifying adjective, but the words appear to have been used to represent the incidents of the death which seemed so near, the bodily anguish, the sense of prostration, almost, one might venture to say, the very presence of the king of terrors. As the word translated “so great” is strictly speaking, used of quality rather than quantity, we might almost translate it, so terrible a death.

And doth deliver.—The words are wanting in some of the better MSS., and others give them in the future. They may possibly have been inserted to carry the thought of the deliverance into the present as well as through the past and the future.

In whom we trust.—Better, in whom we have hoped. The verb is not the same as the “trust” of the preceding verse. The words imply that he was not yet altogether free, as man would judge, from the danger of a relapse. Life was for him, in relation both to bodily infirmities and perils of other kinds, a perpetual series of deliverances.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

1:1-11 We are encouraged to come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need. The Lord is able to give peace to the troubled conscience, and to calm the raging passions of the soul. These blessings are given by him, as the Father of his redeemed family. It is our Saviour who says, Let not your heart be troubled. All comforts come from God, and our sweetest comforts are in him. He speaks peace to souls by granting the free remission of sins; and he comforts them by the enlivening influences of the Holy Spirit, and by the rich mercies of his grace. He is able to bind up the broken-hearted, to heal the most painful wounds, and also to give hope and joy under the heaviest sorrows. The favours God bestows on us, are not only to make us cheerful, but also that we may be useful to others. He sends comforts enough to support such as simply trust in and serve him. If we should be brought so low as to despair even of life, yet we may then trust God, who can bring back even from death. Their hope and trust were not in vain; nor shall any be ashamed who trust in the Lord. Past experiences encourage faith and hope, and lay us under obligation to trust in God for time to come. And it is our duty, not only to help one another with prayer, but in praise and thanksgiving, and thereby to make suitable returns for benefits received. Thus both trials and mercies will end in good to ourselves and others.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Who delivered us from so great a death - From a death so terrible, and from a prospect so alarming. It is intimated here by the word which Paul uses, that the death which he apprehended was one of a character especially terrific - probably a death by wild beasts; note, 2 Corinthians 1:8. He was near to death; he had no hope of rescue; and the manner of the death which was threatened was especially frightful. Paul regarded rescue from such a death as a kind of resurrection: and felt that he owed his life to God as if he had raised him from the dead. All deliverance from imminent peril, and from dangerous sickness, whether of ourselves or our friends, should be regarded as a kind of resurrection from the dead. God could with infinite ease have taken away our breath, and it is only by his merciful interposition that we live.

And doth deliver - Continues yet to deliver us; or preserve us - intimating perhaps that danger had continued to follow him after the signal deliverance to which he particularly refers, and that he had continued to be in similar peril of his life. Paul was daily exposed to danger; and was constantly preserved by the good providence of God. In what manner he was rescued from the peril to which he was exposed he has no where intimated. It is implied, however, that it was by a remarkable divine interposition; but whether by miracle, or by the ordinary course of providence, he no where intimates. Whatever was the mode, however, Paul regarded God as the source of the deliverance, and felt that his obligations were due to him as his kind Preserver.

In whom we trust that he will yet deliver us - That he will continue to preserve us. We hope; we are accustomed to cherish the expectation that he will continue to defend us in the perils which we shall yet encounter. Paul felt that he was still exposed to danger. Everywhere he was liable to be persecuted (compare note, Acts 20:23), and everywhere he felt that his life was in peril. Yet he had been thus far preserved in a most remarkable manner; and he felt assured that God would continue to interpose in his behalf, until his great purpose in regard to him should be fully accomplished, so that at the close of life he could look to God as his Deliverer, and feel that all along his perilous journey he had been his great Protector.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10. doth deliver—The oldest manuscripts read, "will deliver," namely, as regards immediately imminent dangers. "In whom we trust that He will also (so the Greek) yet deliver us," refers to the continuance of God's delivering help hereafter.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

So great a death, in this text, signifies no more than so great a trial of affliction; as he elsewhere saith, he was in deaths often, that is, in dangers of death. Nor (saith the apostle) were we only at that time in danger of our lives, nor had we only at that time an experience of God’s power, goodness, and faithfulness in our deliverance; but we are in jeopardy every hour, and experience the power of God in our deliverance yet every day. And it being for the advantage of the church of Christ, that our lives should be prolonged, (thuogh we desire rather to be dissolved, and to be with Christ), we are confident

that he will yet deliver. Former experiences of God’s goodness in delivering us out of troubles, ought to increase our faith, and beget a confidence in us, that God will yet deliver us, if it may be for his own glory, and our good.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Who delivered us from so great a death,.... Accordingly, being enabled to trust in God, when all human hope and helps failed, to believe in hope against hope, then the Lord appeared for them, and delivered them from this heavy affliction; which, because by reason of it they were not only in danger of death, and threatened with, but were even under the sentence of it, is therefore called a death, and so great an one, see 2 Corinthians 11:23. The apostle expresses the continuance of the mercy,

and doth deliver; which shows that they were still exposed to deaths and dangers, but were wonderfully preserved by the power of God, which gave great encouragement to them to hope and believe that God would still preserve them for further usefulness. The Alexandrian copy leaves out this clause, and so does the Syriac version.

In whom we trust that he will yet deliver us; all the three tenses, past, present, and future, are mentioned, which shows that an abiding sense of past and present deliverances serves greatly to animate faith in expectation of future ones.

Geneva Study Bible

Who delivered us from so {g} great a death, and doth deliver: in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us;

(g) From these great dangers.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

2 Corinthians 1:10. Result of this confidence, as well as the hope grounded thereon for the futur.

ἐκ τηλικ. θανάτου] out of so great death. Paul realizes to himself the special so mighty death-power which had threatened him (and Timothy), and by the expression ῥύεσθαι ἐκ θανάτου (see examples in Wetstein, p. 178) makes death appear as a hostile power by which he had been encompassed. Θάνατος does not signify peril of death (as most say, even Emmerling and Flatt), but it represents that sense. Comp. 2 Corinthians 11:23.

καὶ ῥύεται] The θλίψις, which had been survived in Asia, therefore still continued in its after-effects, which even extended over to Macedonia (perhaps by continued plots against their lives), and Paul and Timothy were still continuing[125] to experience the rescuing power of Go.

ἨΛΠΊΚΑΜΕΝ] have set our hope. See Herm. ad Viger. p. 748; Kühner, II. p. 71; comp. 1 Corinthians 15:19; 1 Timothy 5:5; 1 Timothy 6:17; John 6:45.

ὍΤΙ Κ. ἜΤΙ ῬΎΣΕΤΑΙ] that he will rescue (us) even further, namely, ἘΚ. ΤΗΛΙΚ ΘΑΝΆΤΟΥ, in the continuing danger from the Asiatic enemies which was still to be apprehended in the future. In the fact that Paul speaks of a present, nay, of a future rescue, Rückert finds a support for his opinion regarding a dangerous illness (not yet fully overcome); see on 2 Corinthians 1:8. But could no machinations pass over from Asia to Macedonia? and could not these be recognised by Paul as the more dangerous, in so far as they were more secret? Comp. Acts 20:3.

[125] Hofmann reads the passage: καὶ ῥύσεται, εἰς ὃν ἠλπίκαμεν, καὶ ἔτι ῥύσεται. Accordingly, he takes the first καί as an also, beginning an independent sentence. With this expressive reference to the future Paul looks forward to the wide voyages still before him. In opposition to this we have, from a critical point of view, the facts that ὅτι before καὶ ἔτι is wanting only in B D* 64, and that it is supported by preponderating witnesses, even by those which have the reading ῥύσεται for ῥύεται, as C and א; and, from an exegetical point of view, the fact that the repetition καὶ ἔτι ῥύσεται amounts to a tautology without strengthening the thought in the least: for ἔτι follows as a matter of course from the ῥύσεται already said. Besides, against the whole reference to the shipwreck, see on ver. 8.

Expositor's Greek Testament

2 Corinthians 1:10. ὅς ἐκ τηλικ. κ.τ.λ.: who delivered us out of so great a death, and will deliver (reading ῥύσεται). The form of words recalls Romans 15:31 and 2 Timothy 4:17-18, which would give some support to the theory that the great peril in question was persecution at the hands of opponents; but (as we have said on 2 Corinthians 1:8) it seems more probable that the Apostle’s deliverance was from a dangerous illness. It is possible, indeed, that we have here a reminiscence of Job 33:30, ἐρύσατο τὴν ψυχήν μου ἐκ θανάτου, which would confirm this interpretation. Note that the preposition is ἐκ, not ἀπό; ἀπό would only indicate deliverance from the neighbourhood of a danger; ἐκ indicates emergence from a danger to which one has actually been exposed (see Chase, Lord’s Prayer in the Early Church, pp. 71 ff.). Cf. with the whole phrase 2 Timothy 4:17-18, ἐρύσθην ἐκ στόματος λέοντος, ῥύσεταί με ὁ κύριος κ.τ.λ.—εἰς ὃν ἠλπίκαμεν: towards whom we have set our hope. εἰς with the acc. (see reff.) expresses the direction towards which hope looks; ἐπί with the dat. after ἐλπίζειν (1 Timothy 4:10; 1 Timothy 6:17) rather indicates that in which hope rests. Cf. Psalm 4:6, ἐλπίσατε ἐπὶ κύριον. The perfect ἠλπίκαμεν here has its full force, viz., “towards whom we have set our hope, and continue to do so”; cf. 1 Corinthians 15:19, 1 Timothy 5:5; 1 Timothy 6:17.—καὶ ἔτι ῥύσεται: the force of ἔτι (if indeed it be part of the true text: see crit. note) is to carry the mind on to the perils of the future, as distinguished from those of the present: He will continue to deliver us.

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

10. from so great a death] i.e. from so great peril of death. St Paul speaks of the liability to death as death. Cf. ch. 2 Corinthians 4:11-12. Some regard it as equivalent to ‘so terrible a death.’ Yet surely the mode of death was a matter of trifling consequence to one like St Paul. See Php 1:21-23. Also ch. 2 Corinthians 11:23.

and doth deliver] These words are wanting in many MSS.

we trust] Literally, we have hoped, i.e. with Erasmus, spem fixam habemus. The word here translated ‘trust’ is not the same as that so translated in the preceding verse.

Bengel's Gnomen

2 Corinthians 1:10. Ρύεται, delivers) The present, in respect of this affliction, i.e. whilst we are in a state of death, we are delivered.—ἠλπίκαμεν) we have obtained hope [we have trusted].—ῥύσεται, He will deliver) that I may be able to go to you.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 10. - From so great a death. From a state of dejection and despair, which seemed to show death in all its power (see 2 Corinthians 4:10-12). And doth deliver. Perhaps a pious marginal gloss which has crept into the text of some manuscripts. We trust; rather, we have set our hope. That. This word is omitted in some good manuscripts, as also are the words, "and doth deliver." He will yet deliver us. This implies either that the perils alluded to were not yet absolutely at an end, or St. Paul s consciousness that many a peril of equal intensity lay before him in the future. 2 Corinthians 1:10