#2) 2 Peter 2:1..bought.. = to Buy & Obtain Possession with a New Ownership.

#2) 2 Peter 2:1..bought..
= to Buy & Obtain Possession with a New Ownership.

See also: #1) 2 Peter 2:1..bought.. = to Buy & Obtain Possession with a New Ownership.

Moulton - (a) to acquire by a ransom or price paid, (b) to redeem.

Vine - (a) to buy as in a market-place, (b) figuratively, of Christ having bought men, making them his property at the price of His blood. Note that Vine sees redeem as too strong for agorazo and reserves that thought for its compound form, exagorazo.

Thayer - (a) originally, it meant to frequent the market-place, (b) primarily it means to buy or obtain for a price, (c) figuratively, Christ is said to have purchased his disciples, i.e. made them his private property.

For completeness, let us also look at the meaning of the English word from Webster, where buy is said to mean (a) to get by paying money or some equivalent, or (b) to get as by an exchange.

This is in complete agreement with the meaning of our Greek word.

You will note that the buyer gets whatever is bought, thus the idea of acquiring or gaining possession is present in both the Greek and English words.

"According to the meaning of agorazo, we must take this verse to say that God... acquired some men who proved false.

How, or in what sense, has Christ acquired these men?

Has He acquired them by actually redeeming them by His blood, that is, by delivering them from bondage to sin?

That is obviously not the case here. These men will go into eternity unredeemed and separated from God."

The question then remains, In what sense has God bought, or rather acquired, these false teachers?

Gary Long agrees with the need to retain the full meaning of agorazo.

Long also points out that Peter intentionally alludes to Deuteronomy 32:6 when he refers to the false teachers as "denying the Master who bought them."

You can easily see the parallel, for there we read, "Do you thus repay the Lord, O foolish and unwise people? Is not He your Father who has bought you? He has made you and established you." Deut. 32:6.

If this is a valid allusion, then the final phrase of Deut. 32:6 may shed light on the understanding of bought in our 2 Peter passage. Can he possibly mean bought in the sense of made and established? I think the context demands a serious look at Deuteronomy 32, especially since Peter has just compared these false teachers to the "false prophets that also arose among the people" and apparently alludes to Deut. 32:5 in verse 13 of the same chapter.

This also seems to be consistent with the fact that Peter refers to the one denied as Master (Greek: despotes) not Lord as we might expect if spiritual redemption by the blood of Christ were in view.

Gill on 2 Peter 2:1; "not the Lord Jesus Christ, for the word kuriov is not here used, which always is where Christ is spoken of as the Lord."

"...from the parallel text in Jude 1:4 where the Lord God denied by those men is manifestly distinguished from our Lord Jesus Christ, and by whom these persons are said to be bought:

"the meaning is not that they were redeemed by the blood of Christ, for Christ is not intended; and besides, whenever redemption by Christ is spoken of, the price is usually mentioned, or some circumstance or another which fully determines the sense; see Acts 20:28 whereas here is not the least hint of anything of this kind..."

This word emphasizes God as sovereign ruler over the earth and the one who creates and establishes all things, a thought consistent with the allusion to Deut. 32:6. In fact, if Deut. 32:6 is in Peter's mind, then Master here is more likely a reference to God the Father than to Christ.

It is an assumption on the part of most commentators that Master refers to Christ.

It is also an assumption that bought refers to His death on the cross.

The context must be fairly evaluated. I'm not sure it has been in most of the works I've seen.

In conclusion, I do not pretend to have solved the problem of 2 Peter 2:1. In fact, I may only have raised more questions in the readers mind. However, one thing should be perfectly clear. Whatever else 2 Peter 2:1 may mean, its interpretation must include God ... acquiring these people.

It is not enough to say He paid the price for them. Without the element of acquisition or ownership, any understanding of this verse is false.

See also: #1) 2 Peter 2:1..bought.. = to Buy & Obtain Possession with a New Ownership.


adopted from: Agorazo in 2 Peter, by Jim Ellis