knowing that you were redeemed, not with corruptible things, with silver or gold, from the useless way of life handed down from your fathers,
Received by tradition from your fathers - The mode of worship which had been handed down from father to son. The worship of idols depends on no better reason than that it is that which has been practiced in ancient times; and it is kept up now in all lands, in a great degree, only by the fact that it has had the sanction of the venerated people of other generations.