Expert: Griff Ruby - 12/21/2011

Question
Hi Griff

In Timothy2:17 Says: " And their message will spread like cancer."

I'm puzzled with the word CANCER in that scripture.

I that time when Timothy was written how did they know of
what CANCER was. How did they even know what CANCER's definition was ?

The word CANCER in that scripture is such a modern word and Never Used in that times.

I wonder even if Luke who was a doctor even knew of the word CANCER being a doctor themselves.

What is you take on the word CANCER in this verse ?

THANK YOU GRIFF
GOD BLESS YOU
Ray M.

Answer
Standard online bible references seem to answer this one satisfactorily.
The original word was actually gangrene (from the Greek) and not cancer (one also sees the word canker used for this word in some translations), I cannot account for the strange translations, though perhaps cankor may have been an alternate word for gangrene (in the Romance languages - Spanish, French, Latin, perhaps), and through a couple small letter changes then goes from canker to cancer, which may well have been an early spelling for canker and not a reference to cancer as we know and define it medically today.
The point being made was that the erroneous teachings tend to catch on with many people and also to elaborate themselves by contradicting many more doctrines than originally intended.  The first part, that it catches on with more and more people is kind of like an early way of saying what we might say today of something that it "goes viral."  The second part, that an error on one point spreads logically to errors on other points, might be illustrated as being like a floor of tiles, one color on one side but a different color on the other, but all expected to be put down in a matching way.  So then, when someone wanting the other color at one spot overturns that one tile, exposing a mismatched color.  Being unwilling to return the tile to the matching color of the tiles around it, the stubbornly erring one is then forced to start overturning the neighboring tiles to create an area of matching color, which then ultimately comes to spread to the whole floor.  For example (in Theology), a heretic wanting to deny the sinlessness of Mary must one day realize that if Mary were sinful then Jesus would be a child of Adam and born and conceived in Adam's sin, and then from there that Jesus wasn't actually sinless, and then from there that Jesus wasn't actually God, and then from there that the Trinity doctrine is false, and so on until one ends up denying the whole gospel and becoming either an atheist or a satanist.  All that comes from one false idea that the heretic refuses to let go of, and which, gangrene-like, spreads to and corrupts the heretic's entire world view on everything.
Here is some more information about this biblical expression from a couple online commentaries:

Barnes' Notes on the Bible:
Will eat as doth a canker - Margin, "gangrene." This word - γάγγραινα gangraina - occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It is derived from γραιω graiō, γραινω grainō, to devour, corrode," and means "gangrene" or "mortification" - the death of a part, spreading, unless arrested, by degrees over the whole body. The words rendered "will eat," mean "will have nutriment;" that is, will spread over and consume the healthful parts. It will not merely destroy the parts immediately affected, but will extend into the surrounding healthy parts and destroy them also. So it is with erroneous doctrines. They will not merely eat out the truth in the particular matter to which they refer, but they will also spread over and corrupt other truths. The doctrines of religion are closely connected, and are dependent on each other - like the different parts of the human body. One cannot be corrupted without affecting those adjacent to it, and unless checked, the corruption will soon spread over the whole.

Clarke's Commentary on the Bible:
Their word will eat as doth a canker - Ὡς γαγγραινα· As a gangrene; i.e. as a mortification in the flesh, where the circulation is entirely stopped, and putrefaction takes place, which continues to corrupt all the circumjacent flesh, spreading more and more till death takes place, unless stopped by a timely and judicious application of medicine. Such is the influence of false doctrine; it fixes its mortal seed in the soul, which continues to corrupt and assimilate every thing to itself, till, if not prevented by a timely application of the word of life, under the direction of the heavenly Physician, it terminates in the bitter pains of an eternal death. To such a gangrene the apostle compares the corrupt doctrines of Hymeneus and Philetus.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible:
And their word will eat as doth a cancer,.... Or "gangrene", which gnaws and feeds upon the flesh, inflames and mortifies as it goes, and spreads swiftly, and endangers the whole body; and is therefore to be speedily taken notice of, and stopped. It is better rendered "gangrene", as in the marginal reading, than "cancer".
"The word "gangrene" is Greek (g), and is derived by some authors from the Paphlagonian "gangra", a goat; it being the character of a goat to browse the grass all around without shifting. It is more correct, perhaps, to derive it from the Greek word "manduco", "consumo", I eat, I consume. The "gangrene" is a disease in the flesh of the part which it corrupts, consumes, and turns black, spreading and seizing itself of the adjoining parts, and is rarely cured without amputation. By the microscope, a gangrene has been discovered to contain an infinite number of little worms engendered in the morbid flesh; and which continually producing new broods, they swarm, and overrun the adjacent parts: if the gangrene proceed to an utter sphacelation (or mortification), and be seated in any of the limbs, or extreme parts, recourse must be had to the operation of amputation''
And so the errors and heresies of false teachers worm and spread, and feed upon the souls of men, and eat up the vitals of religion, or what seemed to be such, and even destroy the very form of godliness; and bring destruction and death, wherever they come; and when they get into Christian churches, threaten the ruin of them; and therefore are to be opposed in time, and those infected with them to be cut off.