2. αὐτοὶγὰρἀκριβῶςκτλ.] ‘ For yourselves know accurately’— a further appeal to the Thessalonians’ own experience (cf. 2:1 note), the addition of ἀκριβῶς being due not only to the stress laid by the Apostles on this point in their oral teaching, but perhaps also to the fact that then as now (see below) that teaching had been based on the actual words of the Lord. For a somewhat similar use of ἀκριβῶς cf. Acts 18:25 where it is said of Apollos ἐδίδασκενἀκριβῶςτὰπερὶτοῦἸησοῦ, though it is going too far to find there with Blass a proof that Apollos made use of a written gospel (‘ accurate … videlicet non sine scripto euangelio’ : cf. Knowling E.G.T. ad loc., and see J. H. A. Hart J.T.S. 7. p. 17 ff.). In Ephesians 5:15, the only other Pauline passage where the word occurs, it can mean little more than ‘ carefully’ if we follow the best-attested reading βλέπετεοὖνἀκριβῶς (à*B): if however with àcA ἀκριβῶς belongs to περιπατεῖτε, the thought of strict conformity to a standard is again introduced. The same idea underlies the old Engl. use of ‘ diligently’ by which the word is rendered in the A.V. of Matthew 2:8 (cf. ἠκρίβωσεν ‘ inquired diligently’ v. 7), as is shown by the translators’ own description of their version as ‘ with the former Translations diligently compared and revised.’Ἀκριβῶς is found with οἶδα as here in P.Cairo 3, 8 f. (3./b.c.) ὅπωςἀκριβῶςεἰδῆις, P.Petr. 11. 15 (1), 11 (3./b.c.) εἰδῆσαιἀκριβῶς; cf. P.Hib. 40, 6 f. (3./b.c.) ἐπίστασομέντοιἀκριβῶς. ὕτιἡμέραΚυρίουκτλ.] an evident reminiscence of the Lord’ s own teaching Matthew 24:43, Luke 12:39 : cf. Revelation 3:3; Revelation 16:15, and for a similar use of the same figure 2 Peter 3:10. The absence of the art. before ἡμέρα is due not only to the fact that the expression had come to be regarded as a kind of proper name, but to the emphasis laid on the character of the day, a day of the Lord. It ‘ belongs to Him, is His time for working, for manifesting Himself, for displaying His character, for performing His work— His strange work upon the earth’ (A. B. Davidson, Theol. of the O.T. (1904) p. 375).The phrase is first found in the O.T. in Amos 5:18 ff., where the prophet criticizes the popular expectation that the ‘ day’ was to be a day not of judgment but of national deliverance (perhaps in connexion with phrases like the ‘ day of Midian’ Isaiah 9:4 recalling the victory of Israel over her foes, see W. R. Smith Prophets of Israel2 p. 397 f.). It is very frequent in the later prophecies (e.g. Isaiah 2:12 ff., Zephaniah 1:7 ff., Malachi 3:2; Malachi 4:1), and always with a definite eschatological reference to the term fixed for the execution of judgment: see further A. B. Davidson op. cit. p. 374 ff., and Art. ‘ Eschatology’ in Hastings’ D.B. 1. p. 735 ff., also the elaborate discussion in Gressmann Der Ursprung der israelitisch-jüdischen Eschatologie (1905) p. 141 ff.The actual comparison ὡςκλέπτης is not found in the O.T. (but cf. Job 24:14, Jeremiah 29:10 (49:9), Obadiah 1:5), while the addition of ἐννυκτί, which is peculiar to the present passage, may have led to the belief so widely prevalent in the early Church that Christ would come at night (Lact. Instt. 7:19 ‘ intempesta nocte et tenebrosa, ’ Hieron. ad Matthew 25:6 ‘ media nocte’ ). Ἔρχεται, pres. for fut., lends vividness and certainty to the whole idea (cf. Blass, p. 189).