4 That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children, 5 To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed. (Titus 2:4-5 KJV)
Adam Clarke’s Commentary
Verse 4. That they may teach the young women to be sober] That it was natural for the young to imitate the old will be readily allowed; it was therefore necessary that the old should be an example of godly living to the young. St. Jerome, taking it for granted that drunkenness and impurity are closely connected, asks this serious question: Quomodo potest docere anus adolescentulas castitatem, cum, si ebrietatem vetulae mulieris adolescentula fuerit imitata, pudica esse non possit? “How can an elderly woman teach young women chastity, when, if the young woman should imitate the drunkenness of the matron, it would be impossible for her to be chaste?”
To love their husbands] The duties recommended in this and the following verses are so plain as to need no comment; and so absolutely necessary to the character of a wife, that no one deserves the name who does not live in the practice of them.
Matthew Poole’s Commentary
Ver. 5. To be discreet; swfronav the word signifies temperate, and imports an ability to govern all our affections and passions. Discretion is but one piece of the fruit.
Chaste; the word signifieth pure as well as chaste, and chastity only as it is a species of purity.
Keepers at home; house-wives, not spending their time in gadding abroad, but in looking to the affairs of their own families.
Obedient to their own husbands: the same is required of wives, Eph 5:22, and is due from them to their husbands, as being their head.
That the word of God be not blasphemed: as for the discharge of their duty towards God, so for the credit and reputation of the gospel, that for their carriage contrary to the rules of nature and morality, as well as of religion, the gospel may not be evil spoken of, as if from that they had learned their ill and indecent behaviour.