Reference: Spirits in Prison
Fausets
1Pe 3:18-19. The argument is, Be not afraid (1Pe 3:14,17) of suffering for well doing even unto death, for death in the flesh leads to life in the spirit as in Christ's case, who was put to death in the flesh but quickened in spirit (i.e. in virtue of His divine nature: Ro 1:3-4; 1Co 15:45; 2Co 13:4) in which (as distinguished from in person) He went in the person of Noah (compare 1Pe 1:11 "a preacher of righteousness" (2Pe 2:5; He went not locally but as Eph 2:17, "He came and preached peace," namely, by His ministers) and preached unto the spirits in prison, namely, the antediluvian unbelievers; their bodies seemed free, but their spirits were in prison (Ps 141:9) and they like "prisoners shut up in the prison" just as the fallen are judicially regarded as in chains of darkness, though for a time at large on the earth (2Pe 2:4; Isa 24:18,22-23; 61:1; Ge 7:11, referred to in Isa 24:18). "His Spirit" long "strove" with them, but ceased to do so because even the seed of the godly Seth proved "flesh" and quenched the Spirit (Ge 6:3).
See Verses Found in Dictionary
And Jehovah said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, in his erring; he is flesh. Yet his days shall be a hundred and twenty years.
In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, in the seventeenth day of the month, in this day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of the heavens were opened up.
Keep me from the traps which they have laid for me, and the snares of the workers of evil.
And it shall be, he who flees from the sound of dread shall fall into the pit. And he who comes up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare. For the windows from on high are opened, and the foundations of the earth quake.
And it shall be, he who flees from the sound of dread shall fall into the pit. And he who comes up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare. For the windows from on high are opened, and the foundations of the earth quake.
And they shall be gathered, as prisoners are gathered in a dungeon. And they shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days they shall be judged. Then the moon shall blush, and the sun shall be ashamed, when Jehovah of Hosts shall reign in Mount Zion, in Jerusalem, and gloriously before His elders.
The Spirit of the Lord Jehovah is on Me; because Jehovah has anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;
about His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, who was marked out the Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead;
And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off, and to those who were near.
searching for what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ made clear within them, testifying beforehand of the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that should follow.
But if you also suffer for righteousness' sake, you are blessed. And do not fear their fear, nor be troubled,
For it is better, if the will of God wills it, to suffer for well-doing than for evil-doing. For Christ also once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, indeed being put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the Spirit; read more. in which also He went and preached to the spirits in prison,
For if God did not spare sinning angels, but thrust them down into Tartarus, and delivered them into chains of darkness, being reserved to judgment. And He did not spare the old world, but saved Noah the eighth one, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly.