Beloved, thou doest faithfully
Or a faithful thing, and as became a faithful man, a believer in
Christ; in all his beneficence and charity he acted the upright
part; he did not do it in an hypocritical way, to be seen of men,
and gain applause from them, but from a principle of love, and
with a view to the glory of God:
whatsoever thou doest to the brethren, and to
strangers;
which may design either different persons; and by "brethren" may
be meant the poor brethren of the church that. Gaius belonged to,
and others that were well known to him; and by "the strangers",
not unconverted persons, but such of the saints as came from
foreign parts, and travelled about to spread the Gospel, and
enlarge the interest of Christ: or else the same persons may be
intended, for the words may be read, as they are in the
Alexandrian copy, and some others, and in the Vulgate Latin
version, "what thou doest to the brethren, and this to
strangers"; that is, as the Arabic version renders it, "to
strange brethren"; or, as the Syriac version, "to the brethren,
[and] especially [them] that are strangers"; so that Gaius was a
very hospitable man, one that entertained and lodged strangers,
and used them very civilly and courteously, with great
liberality, and with much integrity and sincerity.