An expository comment, doctrinal, controversial, and practical upon the whole first chapter to the…An expository comment, doctrinal, controversal, and practical upon the whole first chapter to the…

This Verse is acknowledged by many Learned Expositors, to be very difficult, not so much from the matter, for that is easy, as from the grammatical disposition of the words, there being several conjectures, and divers adventures about the transposing of them. In most of the Latin Copies, there are three members in the disjunction, whereas the Greek hath but two, after this manner: Whether we be afflicted, whether we be comforted, and whether we exhort. But according to the Greek word, which is [Greek or Hebrew], this would make a tautology; therefore, no doubt, this was inserted in the Latin Copies, by some, not diligently attending to what they did. Then as for the Greek, Chrysostom doth transpose the words otherwise then we do, putting off the second member of the disjunction, viz. Whether we be comforted, &c. to the next Verse, Knowing that as you are partakers of the sufferings, &c. and then reduceth all the rest to the former part. Some also blame Erasmus, for adding in the Original, (it is;) Whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation: which way our Translators also render. And indeed, the sense would run well enough without it, relating to those words, Our hope of you is steadfast.