he has been their father, he perhaps sets this before them, saying, “For one day I have not been called father by thee.”1058 On this account we too say, “Pray for us also.” I am not merely saying this, but really desiring your prayers. For if I have become responsible for this presidency over you all, and shall have to render an account, much more ought I to have the benefit of your prayers. On your account my responsibilities are greater, therefore the help also from you should be greater. Ver. 26. “Salute all the brethren with a holy kiss.” Oh! what fervor! Oh! what mad passion is here! Because being absent he could not greet them with the kiss, he greets them through others, as when we say, Kiss him for me. So also do ye yourselves retain the fire of love. For it does not admit of distances, but even through long intervening ways it extends itself, and is everywhere present. Ver. 27. “I adjure you by the Lord that this Epistle be read unto all the holy1059 brethren.” And this command is rather from love, and not so much in the way of teaching; that with them also, he means, I may be conversing. Ver. 28. “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.”1060 And he does not merely command, but adjures them, and this from a fervent mind, that even though they should despise him, for the sake of the adjuration they may practice what is commanded. For men had a great dread of that appeal, but now that too is trampled under foot. And often when a slave is scourged, and adjures by God and His Christ, and says, “So may you die a Christian,” yet no one gives heed, no one regards it; but if he adjures him by his own son, immediately, though unwilling, and grinding his teeth, he gives up his anger. Again, another being dragged and led away through the middle of the market- place,1061 in the presence both of Jews and Greeks, adjures him that leads him away with the most fearful adjurations, and no one regards it. What will not the Greeks say, when one of the faithful adjures a faithful man and a Christian, and no regard is paid to it, but we even despise him. Will you allow me to tell you a certain story which I myself have heard? For I do not say it of my own invention, but having heard it from a person worthy of credit. There was a certain maid-servant united to a wicked man, a vile run-away slave; she, when her husband having committed many faults was about to be sold by her mistress; (for the offenses were too great for pardon, and the woman was a widow, and was not able to punish him who was the plague of her house, and therefore resolved to sell him; then considering that it was 1058 Downes would read, “for one day, however, I was called your father.” There is most likely some unknown allusion in the words. 1059 [Textus Rec. of N.T. has “holy”; Rev. Ver. properly omits it.—J.A.B.] 1060 [Ver. 28 seems inserted out of place. What follows refers to “adjure,” in ver. 27.—J.A.B.] 1061 i.e. for debt, to which he probably refers also in speaking against covetousness, Hom. x., near the end. 657 1 Thessalonians 5:19-22