<p>5:15 <em>For already some are turned aside after satan</em>- The Greek for &quot;turned aside&quot; is used four times in the letters to Timothy. Paul knew that some would be turned aside by false teaching (1:6; 2 Tim. 4:4), and he didn't want Timothy to be turned aside by it either (6:20). We see here the importance of Timothy's commission to stamp out false teaching- because this is what it leads to. People listen, and they are led aside from the Kingdom path.</p><p>Note that the widows turn themselves aside after Satan &ndash; Satan is not necessarily seeking the women. Verses 12 and 13 explain that the widows &ldquo;cast off their first faith&rdquo; &ndash; something they did themselves. &ldquo;They learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house&rdquo;. It was by their doing this that they &ldquo;turned aside after Satan&rsquo; &ndash; their evil desires, and the Jewish temple cult. Using the tongue in the wrong way is a result of an evil state of the heart &ndash; &ldquo;out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks&rdquo; (Mt. 12:34). Their turning aside after Satan involved being &ldquo;tattlers... and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not&rdquo; (v. 13). Thus &ldquo;Satan&rdquo; refers to their evil heart. Through profitless talking and not keeping hold of the true spirit of the Word of God, some had &ldquo;turned aside unto vain jangling&rdquo; (1 Tim. 1:6). Paul is now pointing out that some of the young widows in that ecclesia had also turned aside for the same reason &ldquo;unto Satan&rdquo;, or their evil desires, expressed in their idle talking.</p><p>The &ldquo;seducing spirits&rdquo; of :1 had seared consciences (:2), implying that they were apostate believers. They forbad to marry, &ldquo;commanding to abstain from meats&rdquo; (:3), which especially the latter, was the big contention of the Jewish element in the church in the first century. Notice that what is said here about the Judaizers is also true of the Catholics &ndash; supporting the idea that 2 Thessalonians 2 is about both Jews and Catholics.</p><p>Thus the &ldquo;seducing spirits&rdquo; of 1 Timothy 4:1 were the Jewish infiltrators of the church, which were doubtless amongst the &ldquo;deceivers&rdquo; of 2 John 7, which 2 John 10 implies were going from house to house (church to church) spreading their doctrine of belittling the person of Christ. These Judaizers &ldquo;subvert whole houses&rdquo; (Titus 1:11). Back in 1 Timothy 5:13, the fact that the women also went from house to house is another indication that what they were doing was also what the Judaizers were doing. Thus it is an interesting possibility that when their husbands died, these women lacked spiritual leadership, and therefore turned aside after the Jewish Satan, being influenced by the Jews to undermine the church. Using such apparently innocent members of the church would have been a very effective way of infiltrating. Perhaps there is a reference to this in 2 Timothy 3. This speaks of men within the ecclesia, &ldquo;having a form of Godliness, but denying the power thereof&rdquo; (v. 5), unsound judgment in church decisions (v. 8 A.V. margin). &ldquo;Their folly shall be manifest unto all men&rdquo; (v. 9) &ndash; at the Judgment, where the responsible appear. They are likened to Jannes and Jambres, who, according to Jewish tradition, were apostate Jews. These false teachers (probably Judaizers), &ldquo;creep into (i.e. subtly infiltrate) houses (churches), and lead captive silly women&rdquo; (v. 6). Note how the Judaizers are described as capturing Christians to become infiltrators in 2 Timothy 2:26 and in 1 Timothy 3:7. This view of the women is confirmed by the following two points:</p><p>i) Acts 13:50 describes the Jews stirring up &ldquo;the devout and honourable women and (thereby)... raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas&rdquo;.</p><p>ii) There is evidence in profane history that many Gentile women were influenced by the Jews. Thus Josephus (<i>Wars of the Jews</i>, II, 20.2) claims that when the Jews of Damascus were persecuted, the proselyte wives of the Gentiles living there were also attacked. Josephus describes the Gentile wives of the men of Damascus as &ldquo;almost all of them addicted to the Jewish religion&rdquo;. William Barclay says that during the first century &ldquo;the Jewish religion had a special attraction for a woman... round the synagogues were gathered many women, often women of high social position, who found in this (Jewish) teaching just what they so much longed for. Many of these women became proselytes&rdquo; (William Barclay, <em>The Acts of the Apostles</em> (Louisville: Westminster / John Knox, 2003) p. 114). That the women Paul refers to were also wealthy is shown by them having time to go around from house to house, instead of having to work.</p>