Yet she will be saved through childbearing — if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.
Paul has just taught how men and women should behave when the church gathers. He ends with a promise that has puzzled readers for centuries: what saving does he mean, and who are the "they" in the condition he attaches?
What "Saved" Means Here
The promise looks back to Genesis 3:16. Several writers render the phrase "she shall be preserved in childbearing." The help it offers comes in the hour of labour itself.
Arno Clemens GaebeleinVerse 15 refers to Genesis 3:16. She shall be preserved in childbearing, brought safely through the hour of trial and labour, if they continue in faith and love, and holiness with self-control.
Some read eternal salvation into the verse instead. One commentator answers that this mixes up two different things God does. It also takes away the comfort the verse offers.
William KellyThis same letter (1 Timothy 4:10) gives clear proof. God still keeps His preserving goodness fully at work in everyday life, though His grace in the gospel goes deeper, higher, and lasts for ever… No one doubts that there is saving grace in Christ for the believer. But turning this word away from its plain connection robs us of the very point in view. It robs us of this comfort: God does not set aside the solemn mark of judgment laid from the beginning on the pains of childbirth. Instead, in mercy, that pain becomes an occasion for Him to step in and help.
The Wording Itself
Much rests on two small words. Some translators add "her" before childbearing. Others add "the," which would point the phrase to the birth of Christ through Mary. One commentator rejects both:
William KellyChildbearing is well translated "in childbearing," without "her," which is not meant here. "The" is even harder to defend, as if it pointed to the virgin Mary's childbearing — an idea completely foreign to the passage.
The word translated "through" can also mean "in a state of." The Greek article points to her own childbirth.
J. N. DarbySo, for "in a state of"… and in the same way "through the childbearing" in 1 Timothy 2:15. The article marks the childbirth she was to go through… It is a time, state, or period, not a characteristic.
Judgment Turned Into Mercy
God does not lift the pain of childbirth. He meets the woman inside it, and He ties the promise to how she and her husband live.
Hamilton SmithEve suffered for her sin, but the Christian woman will find God's mercy overflowing above the judgment He passes in governing this world, if the married man and woman continue in faith and love and holiness with discretion. Earlier we saw that staying in sound teaching depends so much on a right moral condition (1 Timothy 1:5-6). In the same way, mercy in this life goes with a right spiritual state.
Who "They" Are
Commentators differ on the shift from "she" to "they." One reading takes "they" as husband and wife together. On that view her safety in childbirth depends on how her husband lives as well as how she lives.
C E Stuart"Still," the apostle adds, "she shall be preserved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and love and holiness with self-control." So, while the man is the head of the woman, her preservation in childbearing is tied, in God's government, as much to her husband's behaviour as to her own.
Another writer applies the plural to Christian women in general. He also shows what this condition cuts across: the hopes people pin on the birth of a child.
William KellyThe grammar is unusual, and wisely so. It makes the deliverance granted in mercy personal to her. At the same time it presses the qualifying call on Christian women in general — not on the "children," as some have thought, nor on the husband and wife, as others have said. It calls them to hold to all that fits and strengthens them for these weighty duties. One feels how important such a condition is at a moment when human and even worldly feelings press in, even on children of God. Where is family pride here, or the wish for an heir to dirty money, or the hope of wide influence in the world that crucified the Lord of glory?… It is continuing in faith and love and holiness "with self-control" that is urged on holy women. They could already say, with Christians in general, that God had saved them according to His own purpose and grace, given them in Christ Jesus before time began.
Summary
- Sentence. The verse reaches back to Eden. The pain God attached to childbirth is still real.
- Softened. God does not cancel that mark of judgment. In mercy He turns it into an occasion to step in and help.
- Scope. "Saved" here means being kept safe, not eternal salvation. Reading the higher sense into it takes away the comfort meant for the hour of trial.
- Sense. "In childbearing" is the right rendering — not "her childbearing," and not "the childbearing" of Mary, a thought foreign to the passage.
- Self-control. The promise carries a condition: staying in faith, love and holiness with self-control. Commentators differ on who "they" are — husband and wife, or Christian women in general. Both readings agree on this: mercy in this life goes with a right spiritual state.