John Calvin Commentary 2 Thessalonians 3:6

"Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which they received of us." — 2 Thessalonians 3:6 (ASV)

He now proceeds to correct a particular fault. Since there were some indolent, and at the same time meddlesome and prattling persons, who, to scrape together a living at the expense of others, wandered from house to house, he forbids encouraging their indolence through indulgence. He teaches that those live in a holy manner who provide for themselves the necessities of life through honorable and useful labor.

And in the first place, he applies the term disorderly persons, not to those who live a dissolute life, or to those whose characters are stained by flagrant crimes, but to indolent and worthless persons who engage in no honorable and useful occupation. For this truly is ἀταξία (disorder)—not considering the purpose for which we were made, and not regulating our life with that end in view. It is only when we live according to the rule prescribed to us by God that this life is properly regulated.

If this order is set aside, nothing but confusion remains in human life. This also should be noted, lest anyone take pleasure in busying himself apart from a legitimate call from God. For God has so structured the lives of people that everyone should exert himself for the benefit of others.

Therefore, he who lives for himself alone, being in no way profitable to the human race—indeed, being a burden to others and giving help to no one—is rightly considered ἄτακτος (disorderly). Hence, Paul declares that such persons must be removed from the community of believers, so that they may not bring dishonor upon the Church.

Now we command you in the name. Erasmus translates it as “by the name,” as if it were an adjuration. While I do not entirely reject this rendering, I am, at the same time, rather of the opinion that the particle in is redundant, as in very many other passages, and that this is in accordance with Hebrew idiom.

Thus, the meaning will be that this commandment should be received with reverence, not as from a mortal man, but as from Christ himself; Chrysostom also explains it in this manner. This withdrawment, however, of which he speaks, relates—not to public excommunication but to private social interaction.

For he simply forbids believers to have any familiar association with drones of this sort, who have no honorable means of livelihood in which they may busy themselves. He says, however, expressly, from every brother, because if they profess to be Christians, they are more intolerable than anyone else, inasmuch as they are, so to speak, the pests and stains of religion.

Not according to the injunction—namely, that which we will find him adding shortly afterward: that food should not be given to the man who refuses to work.

Before coming to this, however, he states what example he has given them personally. For doctrine gains much more credibility and authority when we impose no other burden on others than we take upon ourselves. He now mentions that he himself was engaged in working with his hands night and day, so that he might not be a financial burden to anyone. He had also briefly touched on this point in the preceding Epistle, to which my readers should refer for a fuller explanation.

Regarding his statement that he had not eaten anyone’s bread for nothing, he certainly would not have done this, even if he had not labored with his hands. For what is due by right is not gratuitous, and the value of the labor that teachers expend on behalf of the Church is much greater than the food they receive from it.

But Paul had in mind here inconsiderate people, for not all have enough fairness and judgment to consider what payment is due to ministers of the word. Indeed, such is the stinginess of some that, although they contribute nothing of their own, they envy them their livelihood, as if they were idle men.

He also immediately afterward declares that he waived his right when he refrained from taking any payment, by which he implies that it is much less tolerable for those who do nothing to live on what belongs to others.

When he says that they know how they should imitate, he does not simply mean that his example should be regarded by them as a law. Rather, the meaning is that they knew what they had seen in him that was worthy of imitation; indeed, that the very thing of which he is now speaking had been set before them for imitation.