What are the seven cardinal virtues in 2 Peter?
The phrase "seven cardinal virtues" comes from moral philosophy rather than from Scripture, but the Bible has its own list of seven qualities — and the letter of 2 Peter names them one by one, each growing out of the last, starting from faith and ending in love. The order is not decoration; it tells you where to begin, what depends on what, and what crowns the whole.
Seven Added to Faith
Faith is the starting point, not the finished product. Peter names seven things that must be built on it, and the first of them is not what an English reader expects from the word "virtue."
Arno Clemens GaebeleinSeven things are to be added to faith. "Add to your faith virtue." This word means something different from its general meaning in English. It means moral courage, a courage which refuses the gratification of the old nature. It is the soldier's courage, who stands manfully against all opposition. It is an energy by which the heart is master of itself, and is able to choose the good, and to cast aside the evil, as a thing conquered and unworthy of one's self.
Courage Comes First
The classical world had a word for this quality, and it heads the list for a reason: without it nothing else in the list can survive contact with the world.
Frederick W GrantClearly, if in such a world we would obey God, we must expect at once conflict. So the apostle commands as the first thing, if we have faith, that we "add to" it "virtue" — what in Greece or Rome was called that — the soldier-virtue, courage. After this come knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly love; but courage — decision of heart that presses on through all opposition — this is the prerequisite to all these things.
A Chain, Not a Checklist
Each quality guards the one before it from going wrong. Courage without knowledge is reckless; knowledge without restraint becomes extreme.
F. B. HoleWith faith we all have started. But to it virtue or courage must be added, if it is to count for much. Courage needs to be controlled by knowledge. Knowledge to be tempered with moderation. Moderation to develop into patience (or endurance). Endurance begets godliness. Godliness produces and develops brotherly kindness. Love, Divine Love, crowns the whole and welds all together in the heart of the believer.
Self-Control and Endurance in Daily Life
Two of the middle links deal with the friction of living alongside other people — one with what I do to them, the other with what they do to me.
W. T. P. Wolston"And to temperance patience." Temperance will keep me from saying or doing a thing that will wound you, and patience will keep me from being upset by anything that you may do that is likely to wound me. Temperance is active, patience is passive!
Why Love Sits Above Brotherly Kindness
The last two links are often treated as the same thing. Commentators press the distinction hard: warmth toward fellow believers is real and precious, yet it can quietly make people, rather than God, the standard of our behaviour.
J. N. DarbyThe common notion is that brotherly love is charity, and indeed its most perfect form: this is a mistake, as this passage (2 Peter 1:7) shows. That brotherly love is a most sweet and precious fruit of grace, is most true... but it is not charity. We are told to add to brotherly love charity. The reason is simple: if brotherly love, brethren are the object, and though when genuine and pure it surely flows from grace, it easily in us clothes itself with the character which its object gives it, and tends to limit itself to the objects with which it is occupied... Now charity is love; but will not this seek to exercise brotherly kindness? Undoubtedly it will, but it brings in God. "God is love."
Where the Supply Comes From
This is not a self-improvement programme. The diligence is ours, but the resources are given before the list begins.
William KellyFor it is indeed no energy or desert on our part, but His divine power that has granted us all the things that pertain to life and godliness. Faith is the appropriating means.
Inward, Not Worn
The test is whether these things belong to us or are merely displayed by us.
F. B. HoleThese things, notice, are to be "in us and abound" (2 Peter 1:8). They are not to be put on as a man puts on a coat, but to be produced inwardly in the power of the Holy Spirit, so that they become part and parcel of ourselves.
Summary
- Source — the seven are not self-made; God's power has already granted everything that belongs to life and godliness, and faith takes hold of it.
- Start — courage heads the list: the moral backbone that says no to the old nature and presses through opposition.
- Chain — each quality corrects the next: knowledge steers courage, restraint tempers knowledge, endurance grows out of restraint, and godliness follows.
- Crown — brotherly kindness is precious but can shrink to the circle it loves; divine love is added above it and brings God into the reckoning.
- Result — held inwardly rather than worn outwardly, these qualities leave a believer neither idle nor unfruitful.