WHAT IS A FALSE TEACHER? Johnny D. Hinton Pseudodidaskalos is the Greek term translated as “false teacher” in 2 Peter 2:1. It is a compound word from pseudo meaning false, and didaskolos meaning teacher. Some would contend that in order for a teacher to be false, he must be a person of bad character. The person must have evil motives for why and what he teaches. Essentially they want to defer to his conduct rather than the content of his teaching. The problem here is that we do not simply have a noun (teacher) modified by an adjective (false). Rather, what we have is a compound noun. From numerous lexicons (Greek Dictionaries) we see the following definitions: “one who inculcates false doctrines,” “one who teaches what is not true,” “a teacher of false doctrines,” “one who teaches falsehoods,” “a spurious teacher, that is, a propagator of erroneous Christian doctrine.” Teachers teach the teaching. False teachers teach false teaching. The use of “teaching(-s)” here is the same as doctrine. Therefore, false teachers teach false doctrine. This has nothing necessarily to do with his character or his motive, but primarily the content of what he is teaching. He may be honestly mistaken, but still a false teacher. If he is in fact honest in his character, then he will readily admit his error and change accordingly. While many passages in the New Testament refer to our subject in a variety of ways, only 2 Peter 2:1 actually has our term. “But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.” (NOTE: The phrase “damnable heresies” can also be “destructive opinions” which is not just grouping into parties or sects, but rather the ideas contrary to what is written.) Titus 2:3 uses the term kalodidaskalos and is translated as “teachers of good things” rather than as “good teachers.” This shows that the emphasis is not on the character of the teacher (although important), but rather the content or character of what they were teaching (i.e., doctrine). In a similar style pseudodidaskalos could be translated “teachers of what is false.” Jesus is called “good master” (or, teacher) in Matthew 19:16. The phrase used here, however, is didaskale agathe. In this form we have both the noun (teacher) and its modifying adjective (good). This construction does refer to the character of the teacher himself rather than the content of his doctrine. The parallel accounts of Mark 10:17 and Luke 18:18 use the same word construction. If the Holy Spirit had intended for us to understand that he was referring to the false character of a false teacher rather than the false doctrine, he could have done so. There is an adjective form which could have possibly been constructed as such, didaskale pseude, BUT it is not used. What we have then are some folks who are uncomfortable with being called false teachers. They then are trying to invent a new definition for the term so as to point the finger away from themselves. This is self-justifying and points to a character issue. This then may reveal that not only are they teachers of what is false in doctrine but they are also false in their character. _________________ *The Analytical Greek Lexicon Revised (1978 Ed) by Harold K. Moulton, (c)1978, Zondervan. *A Concise Greek-English Dictionary of the New Testament by Barclay M. Newman, Jr. / The Greek New Testament, 3rd Ed., Edited by Aland, Black, Metzger (c)1971, United Bible Societies, London. *Greek-English New Testament Lexicon by George Ricker Berry, (c)1952, Zondervan. *Bauers Greek-English Lexicon, (c)1979, Second Ed., Edited by Danker. *Strongs Greek Dictionary. (c)2002, (May 9th) 219 West 4th Street Wewoka, OK 74884
Posted on: Wed, 06 Nov 2013 08:53:22 +0000
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