Another Bible Commentary: 1 Corinthians

You can read about this church’s origins in Acts 18. Paul wrote this letter to them on his third missionary journey, probably from Ephesus. There were several letters to this congregation from Paul; for example, see 1 Corinthians 5:9. 1 Corinthians is probably the second letter, and 2 Corinthians is probably the fourth letter. We just finished studying Romans, which is well-polished and thorough in its treatment of religious issues. Romans had to be that way; Paul had yet to meet them in person. 1 Corinthians is not like that at all. People well-known to Paul wrote him with religious questions, and he responded to those and to problems he knew about within their congregation. The letters to the Corinthians can be like listening to a person in the same room on a phone and only hearing their half of the conversation. Corinth was a worship center for the sex goddess Aphrodite (with some elements of the Levant’s Astarte), and many sailors passed through there; the sexual immorality (except for the incest in Chapter 5) generally involves temple prostitution. While not all women in Corinth were involved in sexual immorality, the town had a reputation. “Corinthian girls” was a slang expression for hookers; “Corinthianize” was equivalent to “the F-word”. The vice list in Chapter 6 looks like behavior that accompanies Cybele worship which included buggering castrated “Galli”; participating in paganism to keep better Roman jobs was a big temptation for early Christians. Compare 1 Corinthians 6:7-8 with 1 Corinthians 1:2 and 1 Corinthians 6:11 to see that our new identity in Christ is not defined by our deeds, but His. In Heaven, all Christians will be former sinners cleaned up by Him.

1:1 Sosthenes was seen in Acts 18:17.

1:2 like Isaiah 62:12. Jesus already sanctified believers (1 Corinthians 6:11, Hebrews 10:10). The Corinthians were involved in sexual immorality, infighting, and so on, but Paul still acknowledged them as fellow saints. It’s all about what Jesus did and what He still does (Ephesians 2:1-10, Philippians 1:6). There are plenty of saints who don’t have their “living right” merit badge yet, just like there are plenty of saints who are confused about major aspects of the Gospel and how it works, as we will see in the letter to the Galatians.

1:3 Not just sanctification, but unmerited positive treatment (grace) and shalom with all that entails are right up front. The Epistles commonly use the pattern “you are saints already, so why don’t you act like it?”

1:4-7 Believers have the Spirit and every blessing and gift that comes with Him (Ephesians 1:3).

1:8 “He will also keep you…you will be blameless…” Those are promises. Trust Jesus. See Romans 14:4, Philippians 1:6, Philippians 2:13, Hebrews 13:20-21, and Jude 24.

1:9 “God is faithful” See 2 Timothy 2:13. You are never “out of fellowship” with Him.

1:10 This bears repeating: These letters were by location, so not everyone had their theological ducks in a row in the same order. Imagine every allegedly Christian group and all the heretics in your town meeting all at once. This congregation had already begun dividing up into factions that preferred one preacher over another. While any -ism is likely to accumulate some unbiblical teachings, you can see in the Epistles that saints with wrong ideas have been a phenomenon since the beginning. If anyone relies on Jesus for righteousness, they are our siblings in Christ; see 1 John 5:1. Denominations mostly innocently amount to worship style preferences and trivia as long as the most important criterion is met: Jesus living in them. On the other hand, denominations can also attract/focus on one spiritual gift to the exclusion of others. The Body of Christ, with many unique parts meant to work together as one, can locally behave like a sack of eyes, etc.

1:11 “quarrels among you” Peter said Paul was not always easily understandable (2 Peter 3:16); for example, in 1 Corinthians idols are fake in Chapter 8 and demons in Chapter 10. This was bound to happen.

1:12 Apollos is from Acts 18:24-28; Cephas is Peter. Even claiming to follow Christ was another splinter group. See 2 Corinthians 10:7.

1:14 Crispus is from Acts 18:8 and Gaius is from Acts 19:29. Belief is what saves (1 Corinthians 3:21, Acts 13:39, Romans 10:9, Galatians 3:2,5), or Paul would have baptized more people.

1:16 This bit of self-correction means that verse 14 contains an error if it is cited alone. The Bible as a whole is inspired, God worked with human authors, and we worship Immanuel rather than a manual. Large chunks of text and multiple cited verses are preferable to a sound bite.

1:17 Again, belief is the important thing, so Paul’s mission was preaching. Paul stands in contrast to the slick “superapostles” he wrote about in 2 Corinthians. Those weren’t the former commercial fishermen and such that had followed Jesus on Earth or others that are commended in Acts like Apollos, but trained speakers/Sophists that knew how to work a crowd. Paul didn’t empty the Cross of power by relying on flashy high-pressure sales tactics to pump up membership numbers. Paul’s opponents were frequently Judaizers (Acts 15:24).

1:18 “foolishness” The Jews were expecting a victorious military leader to do the things Jesus will do upon His return, so Jesus getting crucified was a problem for them.

1:19 in Isaiah 29:14.

1:21 Belief in Jesus is the important thing.

1:22 See Exodus 4:29-31 and John 6:30.

1:26 “wise by human standards” or as the KJV puts it, “wise men after the flesh”. See the Romans 7:18 note if you need to review what the flesh means.

1:27-29 Works don’t work; no one has anything worth bragging about except for Jesus (Ephesians 2:8-9). See Isaiah 5:21 and Isaiah 29:14.

1:30 Neuter pronouns and audience expectations based on Egyptian courtly literature made Wisdom female in Solomon’s writings. Christ is our wisdom, our righteousness, our holiness, and our redemption; the only things we supply for our salvation is the sin that made it necessary and faith.

1:31 in Jeremiah 9:24.

2:1-2 Of all the things Paul could have preached about in stereotypically nasty Corinth, Christ crucified sufficed. Christ crucified still does; unbelievers don’t need self-improvement and sin management from us, they need His life. God has no interest in us slightly improving the behavior of dead people.

2:3 This “fear and trembling” is the same expression in Philippians 2:12-13. Paul (who got back up after a stoning) wasn’t afraid of the Corinthians or of God, but he had “reverence and awe” (the meaning of the phrase) for verse 2 and for verse 4.

2:4-5 For example, the Corinthians got the gift of tongues as seen in 1 Corinthians 1:5-7 and 1 Corinthians 14.

2:6-8 “among the mature” Paul went into the implications of 1 Timothy 3:16 more deeply in his writings to the Ephesians and the Colossians. While all the bad shepherds will go away, the rulers of this age that had the most to lose by crucifying Christ were the devil and his angels.

2:9 in Isaiah 64:4.

2:12 “God has freely given us” Grace is free.

2:13 “interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual” is the gist, although translation teams vary widely.

2:16 in Isaiah 40:13. “But we have the mind of Christ.” In Hebrew, the mind is part of the heart. Thanks to the New Covenant (Ezekiel 36:26-27), we have Jesus (the fulfillment of Wisdom as seen in Proverbs 8) living inside us.

3:1 Immature Christians are still saved. Paul still addressed the Corinthians as saints (1 Corinthians 1:2).

3:2 Paul metaphorically breastfed them (1 Thessalonians 2:7).

3:3-4 The Matthew 18:3 childlike dependency on God is not the bratty immaturity seen here. For more about this sort of covetousness, see James 4:1-2. The “worldly” and “like mere humans” here in the KJV is “carnal” as in fleshly. They were acting like unbelievers with their factionalism despite being saints (1 Corinthians 1:2) and therefore not “mere humans” anymore. Don’t let that slide by: you are not merely human anymore.

The rest of Chapter 3 has been historically misunderstood regarding eternal rewards in the sense of square footage in your eternal mansion, flashy jewelry, etc. Cups of water are finite. God’s effort lasts forever (Ecclesiastes 3:14), and fleshly effort doesn’t. Grace makes everything free. Jesus got a reward; we get an inheritance because He died. Rewards, apart from God’s approval for things He created you to do and led you to do, for Christian work are people in Heaven (1 Thessalonians 2:19) and any “crowns” get pitched at Jesus’ feet (Revelation 4). Read all of Chapter 3 at the same time. See also Revelation 21 (there is no sadness in Heaven, so you will have everything you need to be eternally happy), Matthew 20 (it all pays the same), Philippians 3:8-9 (knowing Christ is all), Colossians 3:23-24 (the “reward” is an inheritance, unearned, received because Christ died), 1 Peter 1:3-5 (it’s in Heaven for us where we can’t mess it up), Romans 8:17, Romans 8:32, and Galatians 4:7 (we’ll be sharing everything Christ has, which is everything). See Genesis 15:1.

3:5-9 Paul converted them, and Apollos preached sermons to them. If “neither” “is anything”, what of the “reward”? The reward for this sort of work is people in Heaven if they preached Jesus. God’s building is the church (1 Peter 2:5), and a preacher’s ministry works on the building. The same thought continues in the next paragraph.

3:10-13 This is not about each individual’s track record. There is not a separate judgment for Christians (John 5:24), and God’s judgment seat/bema is a throne of grace (Hebrews 4:16) for us. The foundation of any ministry is Jesus, like Peter’s realization that Jesus is the Messiah (Matthew 16:16-18). The best thing to keep preaching/building with is more Jesus, not just sin avoidance or self-improvement. The fire represents the work of a refiner of precious metals. The question behind what Paul wrote is whether church leaders (like the ones he writes against in 2 Corinthians) are saving stones (souls) for the New Temple.

There’s a lot of talk about separate judgments, etc., out there, so to clarify: There is a reward for believers and punishment for unbelievers. There is no double jeopardy, and there is no flaming inheritance. A bema isn’t just for prizes: life and death were/are judged from them by Pilate (Matthew 27:19, John 19:13), Herod (Acts 12:21), Gallio (Acts 18:12), Caesar (Acts 25:10), and Christ (2 Corinthians 5:10). Everyone appears before the judgment seat of Christ, as in all humanity (hence all the evangelism), and Christians get good things thanks to Jesus. Christians have no sins left to judge because Jesus did such a good job (Hebrews 10:14). Unbelievers have nothing praiseworthy to offer, as human good deeds are as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).

3:14 If they preached Jesus, they probably saved people (Hebrews 13:17). Paul and Apollos did well, but the “superapostles” the Corinthians were following instead of Paul in 2 Corinthians were another matter.

3:15 If a saved preacher promotes a bunch of straw instead of keeping it tight on Jesus, he’s not likely to lead people to Jesus. The ineffective ministry goes away, but God keeps His promises to any saved people. See Isaiah 43:2 and Daniel 3:27. The through the flames bit dramatizes being saved narrowly like Amos 4:11. There is no such thing as a flaming inheritance nor a fiery purgatory for believers to atone for wrongs Jesus already handled. Our attempts at behaving didn’t fix us in 1 Corinthians 1:30; Jesus did. Trying to please God led to reaching for the forbidden fruit; trusting God was the original good plan.

3:16-17 Believers are God’s Temple now (Ephesians 2:19-22, 1 Peter 2:4-10). At the group level, destroying this temple would be dividing believers through infighting, false doctrine, etc. There is no divine wrath for believers (Romans 5:9) You are also individually God’s new dwelling place (Romans 8:11), a living Holy of Holies, and are invincible in the eternal sense.

3:18 This is aimed at the “superapostles” that we’ll see more about in 2 Corinthians.

3:19-20 in Job 5:13 and Psalm 94:11. See also Isaiah 5:21 and Isaiah 29:14.

3:21-23 Again, if believers all own the universe with Christ, what would a gift certificate for Heaven’s gift shop as a reward be like? Also, this means your reading list doesn’t have to be tied to a specific denomination’s resources, just remember to verify everything with the Bible.

4:1 See 2 Corinthians 10:2.

4:2 This would be terrifying if the game weren’t rigged in our favor (Philippians 2:13, Jude 24).

4:3-5 Human opinions don’t matter. Don’t condemn; don’t even be down on yourself because only God can rightly judge His handiwork. The “motives of the heart” add up to love in the new hearts of believers. Thanks to Jesus, God’s got only praise for you; bad consequences aren’t mentioned here.

4:6 Emulate the Bereans of Acts 17:11 by checking the Scriptures.

4:7 What do you have that’s not from God? What do we have to boast about?

4:8 They sound like Laodiceans (Revelation 3:17). We already sit on a throne in Heaven (Ephesians 2:6), and can reign in life thanks to His grace (Romans 5:17), but they were acting like they already had this world figured out (1 Corinthians 6:2) in thinking they were better off without Paul (verse 3). Some Judaizer adoptionists said that the Kingdom of Sharing was here.

4:9-11 Paul used this comparison to being led in a parade like captives again in 2 Corinthians 2:14-17. The legitimate apostles had it rough; they lived in poverty, traveled nearly all the time, and got martyred. Paul’s huckster opponents thought it best to skip all that. Paul’s words were prophetic; many Christians died horribly in the arena. Still, their zeal and willingness to die for their convictions converted many Romans. In that culture, gladiators were trained that, when condemned, they were not to cry out or beg for mercy. Seneca described this as the “courage not to seek to avoid the inevitable”, and a “good death” redeemed weakness, passivity, and defeat in the eyes of the crowd.

4:12-13 “work” Paul supported himself financially by working as a tentmaker so he wasn’t always asking his congregations for donations. Paul’s actions (“bless” and “endure”) are in alignment with Jesus’ teachings in Luke 6:27-36, and his patient endurance and kindness are fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23), but also remember the context of this congregation supporting the “superapostles” instead of Paul (2 Corinthians 11:20-21).

4:14-21 This passage is hypothesized by some to be (or be a lot like) the proposed “first letter” to the Corinthians.

5:1 “sexual immorality…pagans do not tolerate” See Acts 15:20. Bedding a stepmother/mother was against Roman law, too. The quasi-Epicureanism alluded to in Jude may have been a factor, or the half-understood notion that totally forgiven people can do anything that Sin suggests without causing them any problems. The reputation of their church was at stake (Exodus 32:25, Mark 9:42, 1 Corinthians 3:16-17). The Romans could be strict. Emperor Augustus exiled his own daughter for, in part, sexual immorality.

If you asked people living under the Old Covenant what was sexually immoral, they had a list of rules from God about what was allowed for them. Leviticus even differentiates behaviors off-limits to them as Jews and behaviors forbidden to all humanity, practices blamed for getting the Canaanites (who were never under the Law of Moses) removed from the Promised Land. These were things pagan kings in Genesis knew better than to get involved in, things done by people reduced to ash in Genesis 19 (see Jude 7), etc. When the Old Testament was translated from Hebrew into Greek, there was a problem. The Greeks lacked a word for the concept back then because their own standards of sexual morality were very different. The word the translators went with was porneia which provides the root word for words like pornographic. It approximately means “things hookers do”, and here’s why: in Greco-Roman culture at the time, men were allowed one wife (it kept the inheritance simple) but the husbands could go out and get access to any orifice from any gender of slave, prostitute, temple prostitute, etc. There was no judgment baked into the word, it just meant “stuff not going on with the respected, noble-born mother of your children”. Now look at 1 Corinthians 5:1. Paul was concerned about the porneia reported among them, specifically that a man in their congregation was shacked up with his father’s wife. Did any of you ever read that verse and think he was paying her? Since it’s not about hookers, where does Paul derive his prohibition of their relationship? Leviticus 18:3,7-8,24-28. This discussion is also at work wherever English translators choose “fornication” to stand for porneia. Fornication is used to refer to sexual activity that occurs out of wedlock; it is a common topic among those who advocate for the one-man-with-one-woman paradigm. The biblical existence of righteous polygamists (Abe, David, etc.), concubines, concubines used for breeding additional slaves (Exodus 21:4), etc., along with a few regulations about prostitution but no outright ban of the practice call into question the utility of the “sex outside wedlock” concept outside of the extra rules humans have imagined. Christians aren’t under the Law of Moses (Leviticus 20:11, Deuteronomy 27:20), but Christ within us doesn’t lead us to do things that no human is supposed to do, either. In summary, the concept of “fornication” is the result of centuries of philosophy’s influence on Christianity, porneia is a placeholder word used when Hebrews wish to communicate with Greeks about sexual immorality, and God’s standards enumerated in Leviticus 18 and Leviticus 20 (which can be derived from the stories in Genesis, etc.) are the same throughout time.

5:2-5 The Church is in Christ, the Kingdom of God, and provided material support to constituents like the synagogue system before it. The devil (2 Corinthians 4:4) is claiming the world outside the Church at the moment. Paul said to kick the sex offender out of the meetings and potlucks (Matthew 18:15-17) so he wouldn’t harm the congregation’s reputation (Mark 9:42, 1 Corinthians 3:16-17, 2 Corinthians 6:3). The “destruction of his flesh” would have been him getting hungry enough to reconsider his choice of partner, facing any Roman consequences that caught up with him, etc. The allegedly worst sinner Paul wrote about was still going to be okay, physically alive or not, at the return of Christ (John 6:37). Paul told them to welcome him back (which would have been hard to do if he had died) and that he had only recommended this temporary excommunication to see if they would obey him (2 Corinthians 2:9). Loving their neighbor in this case meant encouraging him back onto the right path (Leviticus 19:17). At no point did Paul stop to ask if the couple’s love was genuine, meaning the “love is the greatest commandment” exception to sexual morality doesn’t work like many today think it does. Paul did not write the Corinthians to say, "Shame on you for judging that man that's sleeping with his father's wife. Can't you see they love each other? No, don't shun him; let him be your pastor." We have allowed the meaning of "faithfulness" to creep toward "fidelity to one partner" instead of "being dependable in all of your relationships, whether it be to support lawful wives/concubines or to honor God and His sexual hangups." Much like Jesus did after saving a woman caught in adultery (John 8), after salvation the Church encourages people to live lives worthy of our calling.

5:6-8 Bragging (verse 2) of their tolerance of this issue was hurting their witness (Romans 13:3, 2 Corinthians 6:3). Paul used a Passover metaphor (Exodus 12:15) to basically say “you’re saints; act like saints”.

5:9 “my letter” A lost earlier letter is hypothesized by some to be (or be a lot like) 2 Corinthians 6:14 through 2 Corinthians 7:1.

5:10 Separation from the world was the Essene and Pharisee approach (by different methods), but we are to be in the world (to save people) even though we are not of this world.

5:11 Eating with someone showed that you approved of them; people objected to Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners. This also extends to the Lord’s Supper. But, see 1 John 5:1. This is not a license to be unloving, but you can totally shun someone (aka healthy boundaries and distance) and still be right with them with regard to God. See 2 Thessalonians 3:14-15 and Titus 3:10. If we disfellowshipped every Christian that ever sins, the place would be empty (James 3:2). So, why these specific sins? Among the things that got the Canaanites killed, the sexual immorality that Corinth was most notable for was temple prostitution as in the service of Aphrodite. Blackout drunkenness as in the worship of Bacchus (but God dislikes watered down wine in Isaiah 1:22, Paul had been participating in the four drink minimum at Passover since he was twelve, and Jesus had a reputation for partying too much, so we’re talking really Genesis 19:35 hammered here) and idolatry in general round out the “Jesus is not just another idol to add to your pantheon” sins. See Deuteronomy 8:18; since God prospers you, blameworthy greed involves other peoples’ blessings. The “greedy” here is pleonexia, coveting more and more without regard to the rights of others (Amos 8:4-6, Micah 2:2, Micah 6:10-12, and Habakkuk 2:5-10 have the right flavor), which pairs well with the “swindlers", which also carries the flavor of extortion and robbery (Isaiah 61:8) in the Greek. The “slanderers” or verbally abusive or railers depending on your translation would have, in this context, been stirring up fights with other groups and the government. Plus, Paul knew this church: he may have had specific individuals in mind. If this were the letter to the Romans he hadn’t met personally, Paul might have generalized something like: “Don’t jeopardize your witness and make things harder for our movement by associating with practicing pagans, notorious criminals still victimizing people, and people picking fights with the Roman government. Also, attracting unwanted attention from the cops isn’t a great idea, either. ”

5:12-13 On the other hand, we’re not the culture police. Outsiders only need the grace of Jesus from us (Matthew 7:6).

6:1 The Romans were content to let religious or ethnic groups sort out their own disputes as long as Roman law was not the issue (Acts 23:29).

6:2-3 To “judge” can be to condemn or to rule. When Jesus takes over the world, we’ll be with Him (Zechariah 14:5, 1 Thessalonians 4:14, Revelation 19:14). See Daniel 7:18, Daniel 7:27, Isaiah 55:5, and Isaiah 32:1-2. Notice that Paul does not command being a lawsuit doormat like a common interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount.

6:4 Remember this context in a few verses.

6:5-6 The Romans already spoke of the Christians poorly, and these believers were airing dirty laundry in public, providing fodder for gossip and giving the impression of a community dependent on outsiders for help.

6:7 See 1 Corinthians 3:3. Since 1 Corinthians 6:2-3 allows this method of settling disputes, Paul said to prefer being wronged or cheated to dishonoring their congregation in a pagan court (1 Corinthians 6:1). Jesus’ Jewish hyperbole about what fulfilling the Law of Moses’ prohibition of revenge would look like and trusting the God that pays double for trouble in Matthew 5:39-41 often colors the interpretation of 1 Corinthians 6:7 and makes people forget the context of what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 6:2-3.

6:8 Read this verse again. These wrongdoers currently engaged in wrongdoing when Paul wrote them are still addressed as (sanctified, certainly Heaven-bound) saints (1 Corinthians 1:2, 1 Corinthians 6:11). Thank you, Lord Jesus Christ, for your finished work.

6:9-10 Look at verse 11 first. There has been a change of identity. Some of the believers had done these things (and were still involved in some suspect behavior in verse 8), but they were no longer these categories of sinner by nature. For example, a believer that told a lie is not a liar but a child of God with a lying problem. See John 6:37 and Romans 8:33-34. Sinners sin; Christians can choose sin (and nothing good comes of it), but it’s out of character and not how we’re destined to be in eternity. Who were these people by nature in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10? The people in verse 4 that Paul said were unfit to judge believers. This is another “don’t live like the damned” passage. The meanings of these sins match those we discussed in 1 Corinthians 5:11 with the addition of adulterers, thieves, and the active (arsenokoites derived from Leviticus 20:13, which looks back to Leviticus 18:3,22,24-28) and passive participants in buggery. To anyone inclined to feel attacked by what I’m writing, there are many books available today that take the stance that homosexuality of any kind is not sinful, and your enemies will not read those books. A work that takes the ancient tome seriously about one specific activity between men (which in that historical and cultural context would have usually involved things like pagan rituals, pederasty, displays of dominance akin to prison rape, etc.) that also takes the ancient tome seriously about the necessity of kindness for everyone might get through to those who claim to take the ancient tome seriously. The meanings of words drift over time. Here, malakoi means catamites or those getting buggered. Modern Greek slang uses malakoi ”soft” for masturbators, but authors of the period used dephesthai for that kind of “softening”, and there will be more to say about that in our discussion of Colossians 2:20-23. This vice list as a whole may also resemble the temptation of Christian believers to pretend to still be pagan to keep better jobs by participating in worship services for Cybele (that involved anally penetrating castrated Galli priests or slaves), Bacchus, Aphrodite, etc. Saying that these various behaviors won’t keep happening in the World to Come is not surprising.

6:11 Believers in Christ are already sanctified (Hebrews 10:10) because of Jesus’ finished work. Salvation completes a change in identity, so even the Corinthians were called saints. If you know you are as clean and close to God as you ever will be, you will start to think like someone that is clean and close to God, and then acting like it becomes natural. The violent revolutionary particularly remembered for thievery in Luke 23:43 made it to Heaven with only faith in Jesus, so the sins of 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 are not unforgivable.

6:12 See Romans 6:14. You really do have the right, in the religious dimension, to do anything. God’s not keeping track of your sins. How do you define sin without a Law? Sinning is doing what the entity called Sin says to do. Sin lies, Sin does not have your best interests at heart, and sinning just doesn’t fit you now that you have changed. How do you know what to do? Listen to Jesus in your new heart.

6:13-15 Paul later said in 1 Corinthians 15:37,50 that our bodies now are analogous to seeds for our resurrection bodies, making them temporary/ephemeral, but they’re special now, too, because He lives in you. Don’t join God’s Temple to other gods. This is the context, because Paul referenced Numbers 25 (which included ritual sex for idols) in Chapter 10 of this letter, too. Believers using Jesus’ home to worship Aphrodite by having sex with temple prostitutes is reminiscent of Ezekiel 8.

The Accuser is trying to make us forget temple prostitution existed to muddy things. As a hedge against that, let me record here that as recently as the January/February 2014 Biblical Archaeology Review said “Indeed, archaeology has shown that Ashtoreth worship and associated rites of sacred prostitution were common throughout the ancient Mediterranean. At the Etruscan site of Pyrgi, excavators identified a temple dedicated to Ashtoreth that featured at least 17 small rooms that may have served as quarters for temple prostitutes. Similarly, at the site of Dura-Europos on the Euphrates, archaeologists uncovered a temple dedicated to Atargatis, the Aramaic goddess of love. Fronting the entrance to the temple were nearly a dozen small rooms, many with low benches. Although the rooms were used primarily for sacred meals, they may also have been reserved for the sexual services of women jailed in the temple for adultery. Such a situation prevailed at the temple of Apollo at Bulla Regia, where a woman was found buried with an inscription reading: ‘Adulteress. Prostitute. Seize (me), because I fled from Bulla Regia.’ Sacred prostitution, therefore, existed in much of the ancient world and reflected the ritual practices of Ashtoreth worship.”

In the Law of Moses, apart from Leviticus 21:9 forbidding priests’ daughters from the trade, Leviticus 19:29 forbidding pimping out your own daughter, or the use of it by the Temple for profit in Deuteronomy 23:17-18, non-religious prostitution was tolerated. The Food and Drug Administration regulates food and drugs, but food and drugs can be obtained legally without much difficulty. Saying “no whores” would have been a lot simpler if that were His intent; legislating a few exceptions implies a broader legality. There were always castoffs and Gentiles doing non-procreative gray-area activities that fit into the cultural boundaries seen in Song of Songs/Solomon, Proverbs 6:26, etc. Two whores wouldn’t have asked for a public trial in the godly early days of Solomon about that dead baby (1 Kings 3) if they were worried for their lives. If the Law of Moses that we cannot keep (Acts 15:10) is lenient about something, why are we as a Church particularly judgmental about it? Life did not get harder under Grace: we didn’t start with shellfish avoidance under the Law and then eat fewer things under Grace, and we didn’t start with one Sabbath under the Law and then have to keep two under Grace.

6:16 in Genesis 2:24. “One flesh” implies the unpaired are not whole in the sense that it takes a pair to reproduce a human (God’s Image); Paul’s concern is for children conceived with unbelievers in 1 Corinthians 7:14. This was the same concern in Malachi 2:15. See also Numbers 25:3,8. Jesus used Genesis 2:24 to discuss the ideal permanence of marriage, but based on Exodus 21:4 (masters could breed slaves) and Exodus 22:16-17 (fathers can refuse suitors even after coitus), “one flesh” does not equal “wed”.

6:17 The Church is the Bride of Christ (Isaiah 62:4). He is our Faithful Friend (1 Samuel 18:1). This goes even deeper than that. You cannot “fall out of fellowship” with someone you share a spirit with. Christ is your life (Colossians 3:4, Galatians 2:20) in whatever circumstances you find yourself.

6:18 “sexual immorality” as defined by Leviticus 18, especially universal principles that got certain historical Gentiles (who never had the Law of Moses) killed.

6:19 These bodies are ephemeral (1 Corinthians 15:37,50), but God lives in them even now. See Isaiah 53:12; a steep bride price was paid for us.

6:20 “honor God with your bodies” by not joining them to Aphrodite is the implication here.

1 Corinthians 7 – Paul responded to a number of questions here, and without context his answers can seem self-contradictory. 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 are from Jesus, and the rest of Paul’s instructions are his reasoning (verse 6) about the matter. As I have said, these letters weren’t Paul’s best day on the job. 1 Corinthians 1:14,16 admits to Paul’s fallibility. Make sure anyone giving you static about 1 Corinthians 7 is also perfectly following the head covering instructions of 1 Corinthians 11, etc. Again, Chapter 10 makes it clear that the primary sexual concern was pagan ritual sex and there’s, at most, a girl with a “Do It For Aphrodite!” tattoo within driving distance of me. Finally, there are things in these letters that seem odd. For example, 1 Corinthians 11:13-16 can look odd given Paul’s Nazirite vow back in Acts 18:18 (and the existence of Nazirites in general – Numbers 6), so use clearer sections of the Bible to figure out Paul’s meaning. Ultimately, Paul affirmed the legitimacy of both marriage and singleness and balanced the duties of Ephesians 5:21-33 and 1 Corinthians 7:32-35. The context of a temporary world (verse 31) with exceptional present difficulties (verse 26) applies throughout.

7:1 Paul is not one of the “super-apostles” that he criticized in 1 Timothy 4:3. Let’s look at the background. In all things, there seems to be a pendulum. Mostly celibate Greek philosophers formed in reaction to over-the-top Greek behavior. Aristotle’s obsession with the telos or highest purpose of things led to considering the only purpose of sex to be procreative, and Plato’s spirit-good-matter-bad rhetoric along with Stoicism’s supreme esteem for controlling the passions made celibacy a badge of honor (or intellectual pridefulness). It seems that some of the Corinthians had asked Paul if their approach was acceptable, and since Paul ultimately cares about faith in the risen Christ, he said that celibacy was one acceptable option. Remember that 1 Corinthians 7 shares a binding with the Old Testament in which polygamy, concubines, breeding slaves, and most forms of non-religious prostitution are also options. For example, there’s nothing wrong with having multiple wives (Numbers 31:40-41, 2 Samuel 12:8) unless your government says not to (Romans 13). Remember the Song of Solomon/Songs and the freakier bits of Ezekiel, too.

7:2 “But since sexual immorality is occurring (in Corinth), each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.” Your translation may add words like “sexual relations”, but the Greek is broader in meaning. This isn’t a command like verses 10-11, so Paul told the freaky Corinthians to pair up and not to commit adultery, buggery, etc. This also addressed the appearance of impropriety as in 1 Corinthians 8:9. Corinth was perhaps freakier than a Spring Break Mardi Gras at a Hedonism Resort that is also somehow in a brothel in Reno, Nevada that was in service to false gods; the Corinthians were way past advice like Colossians 2:21-23. The unmarried state is also affirmed in verse 8. Paul talks himself around to the other view by 1 Corinthians 7:28. Also, if married intercourse doesn’t defile the Temple of the Holy Spirit, the other Leviticus 15 wash-and-waits like masturbating (Colossians 2:21-23) are okay too.

7:3 “The husband should fulfill his duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband.” Your translation may add words like “marital”, but the Greek is broader in meaning. Ephesians 5:21-33 explains Christian marriage better. Marriage is an illustration of Christ and the Church, in which a woman promises things like sexual fidelity and respect to a man who provides things like food, clothing, and shelter. Notice that’s fidelity and material provision, not guaranteed sex. Preachers telling Christians that it’s mandatory humpty time sounds just like the temple prostitution that God abhors. Mutual submission in marriage amounts to being considerate and loving. 1 Corinthians 7:3 is frequently used to deny that marital rape exists. I shouldn’t have to spell this out for people with the Holy Spirit, but here we go: sex without consent is rape and rape is unloving. Demanding that from an ill/unwilling/etc. spouse is not the Christlike self-sacrifice in Ephesians 5:25. See also 2 Samuel 20:3 and 1 Kings 15:5.

7:4 This just legitimizes the demands of marriage in 1 Corinthians 7:32-35. What you may think is a waste of time and money may be God being kind to your spouse through you.

7:5 The people asking about whether celibacy was an appropriate walk for a Christian had apparently asked about leaving their spouses to focus on building the Church (among famine and persecution) exclusively, and Paul just emphasized that marriage should not have been their primary concern. Or, for those who think in references, the verse 1 people asked about verses 10-11 to do verse 29, and verse 5 and verses 32-35 are the compromise. The cessation of intercourse to pray resembles Exodus 19:15 at a surface level, but Christians are dead to the Law, so this is more like fasting to focus on your ministries for Christ. “Do not deprive each other (note: this would include all marital obligations, like failing to provide food/clothing/shelter to a wife because of your preaching tour – see Ephesians 5:29) so that you may devote yourselves to prayer except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time. Then be together (note: not the more salacious “come together” in many translations) again (note: doing the Ephesians 5:21-33 things) so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.” Some translations’ sentence order seem to make religious exercise the only exemption from “marital duty”, but other reasons for not having sex (like illness and lack of consent) are fine.

7:6 See also 1 Corinthians 7:35. Paul admits he’s just riffing here.

7:7 “as I am” Paul is unmarried per verse 8.

7:10-11 We explored the nuances of Jesus’ teaching about divorce at length back in Matthew 5:32. God got a Deuteronomy 24:1-4 divorce in Jeremiah 3, so Jesus’ teaching was about the incorrect application of that rule by the Hillelites. Therefore, Paul does not contradict Jesus in 1 Corinthians 7:15. Christians are dead to the Law of Moses, but sexual morality is part of the older Noahide Laws; the pagan leaders Abraham and Isaac dealt with in Genesis 12, Genesis 20, and Genesis 26 had proper respect for marriage. In context, 1 Corinthians 7:10-11 is about not improperly abandoning spouses, especially to somehow help a ministry (verse 1, verse 29, and verses 32-35). Christ’s instructions are about spouses, not abusers (1 John 3:15). Again, the misuse of Deuteronomy 24:1-4 for those “for any reason” divorces was what Jesus spoke against, not the pikuach nefesh-based fleeing an abuser that even the Shammai followers would have approved. For those of us in difficult relationships that don’t meet the “abusive” definition, etc., if we could see the whole path, then we wouldn’t need to trust Him to light it. We have the whole armor of God and every spiritual blessing as Christians, so we definitely have whatever “just enough for now” we need to have from Christ on a moment-by-moment basis. God knew you before He created you, and He is proud of you. Our performance is under construction, but He’s proud of you even now. You and a fellow human may be yelling at each other six times a day, but that’s because you are still together; God is proud of your endurance.

7:12-13 “I, not the Lord” Paul went back to riffing again; “must not divorce” Take that, Ezra. See the Ezra 9:1-2 note. Paul addressed the case of when one spouse had converted to Christianity but the other had not yet done so. The 2 Corinthians 6:14 (from Deuteronomy 22:10) stuff Paul also said was about a believer getting married to an unbeliever.

7:14 “sanctified…holy” This appears to be the more mundane “set apart” in contrast to what only Christ can do (1 Corinthians 6:11, Hebrews 10:10). The believer’s influence in their lives provided a ladder up from paganism for their spouses and children. If marrying a believer guaranteed salvation, verse 16 would read differently.

7:15 Again, “unequal yoking” was a concern for initiating a marriage, not for a new convert still married to their old pagan spouse. Letting the unbeliever leave is not the same as kicking them out. This does not contradict what Jesus or Paul said in context about divorce. Remember, the bit about marrying a divorced woman being adulterous was in reference to a scenario like that of Herod Antipas in which a woman was enticed to divorce their spouse for the purpose of remarrying. Anyone abandoned by a spouse was subsequently freed of obligation (“not bound”) due to the breach of contract. Even better, “God has called us to live in peace.”

7:17 Paul makes his meaning clearer in the following verses. You don’t necessarily have to change jobs because of your conversion (Luke 3:13-14), just maybe what you do there.

7:18,20 See Romans 3:29-30. Paul vigorously defended the right of Gentile Christians to remain Gentiles because a) Jesus did it all, He’s the only way and b) The prophets predicted that the nations of the world would worship God along with the Jews, not that they would become Jewish.

7:19 “Keeping God’s commands” Remember, we’re under the New Covenant, so this amounts to “Believe in Jesus”, “Love”, “avoid the Acts 15:20 stuff”, etc.

7:21 Saving up to buy your freedom is not donating everything. If you’re paying property tax and income tax, an ancient Egyptian would still call you a slave (Genesis 47:19-24). In the old days, people worked until they died or their five sons had to farm for them. Now, with doctors increasing human life spans far beyond our productive years, building your portfolio of investments to avoid being a bum (Romans 13:8) is important. See the Matthew 6 notes for more.

7:23 This would have been a result of unpaid debt.

7:24 Unless you can get free (1 Corinthians 7:21), then do that instead.

7:26 “present crisis” Popular guesses include famine and persecution.

7:28 Hopefully, the people Paul told to marry in verse 2 didn’t run out and do that before verse 28.

7:29 This is about not letting marriage be the primary concern, since Paul already said verses 10-11.

7:32 See Matthew 19:10-12.

7:33-34 This concern for spouses is legitimate per verse 4.

7:35 “not to restrict you” Again, Paul is just riffing as in verse 6. We really are free (1 Corinthians 6:12). The way to live in devotion to the Lord is “free from concern” as in verse 32; trust Him.

7:36-38 In some translations, this is about a father marrying off a daughter that he is starting to find attractive to avoid another Leviticus 18 no-no (Leviticus 18:17).

7:39-40 Again, Paul played both sides of the fence on this issue. He probably already tried telling them to Believe, Love, and avoid the Acts 15:20 stuff that God finds gross, and they kept asking questions (1 Corinthians 7:1).

From 1 Corinthians 8:1 through 1 Corinthians 11:1, Paul addressed food sacrificed to idols. Pagan temples were like community centers with a regular schedule of banquets/potlucks. The leftovers were sold in the market. See Romans 14 for more on this topic.

8:1 “knowledge” The knowledge here is that idols represent fake gods (and therefore nothing). As in Romans, the point Paul pressed toward was that idols are nothing, but love is greater than that knowledge, so don’t insist on being free in a group context if it causes your brother to stumble or if it divides the Church (1 Corinthians 10:32).

8:2-3 Paul’s opponents in 1 Timothy 4:3 and 2 Timothy 2:14-26 were learned/puffed-up in other ways, too.

8:4 As long as you know that God is God, you can read or watch all the mythical junk you feel like.

8:5 like in John 10:34-36.

8:6 God alone is God as in the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4). We experience God in three Persons.

8:7 As in Paul’s letter to the Romans, the “weaker brother” is the more scrupulous. Instead of Jewish Christians as in Romans, here it’s some former pagans that were especially sensitive.

8:8 Formerly pagan Christmas and Easter are symbols of what our faith does to sanctify former pagans. As long as you know that God is God, you can dress up for Halloween, eat candy, and watch superhero movies too. See the 1 Corinthians 9:24-25 note.

8:9 Avoiding even the appearance of sinfulness is an old Jewish concept: marit ayin.

8:10 “in an idol’s temple…sacrificed to idols” Being seen crashing the potluck after the service might have given the impression that Christians had attended.

8:11 “destroyed” Hyperbole for “distressed”, as in Romans 14:15.

8:12-13 This is about being respectful of each other in our homes, churches, and personal dealings; not permanently swearing off behaviors you are okay with in light of what Scripture and the Holy Spirit say because someone else somewhere in the world has an issue with it. See also Galatians 2:12, where Peter basically did what Paul said to do in 1 Corinthians 8:13 and got reprimanded by Paul for it, although admittedly that issue was more nuanced.

9:1 Paul defending his ministry to the Corinthians is an even bigger theme in 2 Corinthians. This tangent about that issue here is ultimately still about the issue of being seen eating food that others find questionable (1 Corinthians 9:23, 1 Corinthians 10:33).

9:2 “not be an apostle” Paul’s opponents, the “super-apostles” (2 Corinthians 11:5, 2 Corinthians 12:11), attacked Paul’s credentials (2 Corinthians 10:12-13).

9:3-8 See Luke 10:7. Also, this was written after Acts 18 and therefore after the Acts 15 split, so either Paul and Barnabas had already reconciled or Paul at least still respected Barnabas as an apostle. Also, again, the “first Pope” Peter had a wife.

9:9 in Deuteronomy 25:4.

9:10-12 Those in full-time ministry have a right to earn a living (food, clothing, and shelter for themselves and for their believing wives and minor children) for doing that. Shepherding the flock is not a way to get rich (1 Timothy 6:5). Ministers are not required to abandon other occupations, as Paul supported himself and others as a tentmaker. There’s nothing stopping a pastor from being a wealthy tentmaker, though (Deuteronomy 8:18). The point Paul was supporting here is that he had rights that he gave up for the purpose of saving more people, so the Corinthians could give up eating idol meat sometimes.

9:13 like Deuteronomy 18:1-5.

9:14 “should receive” as in “are entitled to” per Luke 10:7, and not “are required to” as disproved by Paul the tentmaker.

9:17-18 See Acts 9:15. Paul refuses credit for stuff he’s supposed to do since he had no choice as far as his calling to preach.

9:21 “Christ’s law” aka Christ’s Rule (Galatians 6:2). He is Lord. He rules. He says to Believe and Love. In other words, Paul is not dead to God and alive to sin like the Gentiles to whom he preached (Romans 6:20).

9:22 “weak” Scrupulous.

9:23 “for the sake of the gospel” Paul got back to the point of his idol food argument.

9:24-25 If athletes try so hard to possibly win a rotting wreath, how much more (familiar words by now, I hope) ought we contend for others’ souls? Paul’s metaphors do not depict someone removed from the culture of his day. Jesus spoke of the introductory trumpets for actors (Matthew 6:2) when He criticized the Pharisees. Some of Joseph’s construction work might have been for the Herodium. Paul used many sports metaphors like Philippians 2:16, Galatians 2:2, Galatians 5:7, 2 Timothy 4:7, etc. See also Hebrews 12:1. Since games and theater were often in honor of pagan gods, the grocery meat exception applies to spectators as well.

9:26 Shadow-boxing was a training method. Greek boxing at the time was pretty brutal. Eye pokes were not allowed, but there were no protective pads, etc., and “ground and pound” was the norm. Viewing of and participation in combat sports (with willing participants) is not unloving. If it were entirely impermissible for us, Paul would have selected a different example, right? Your hobbies and interests help spread the Gospel by connecting you to others. Looking at a map of the ancient world, God put His people at the crossroads to reach everyone.

9:27 “not be disqualified” in ministry; such statements are frequently misapplied by those who teach that salvation can be lost. See 1 Corinthians 10:33, 2 Corinthians 6:3, and Nehemiah 6:13. Still not convinced of your eternal security in Christ? See Romans 8:38-39 and John 10:28-30.

10:2 This baptism would logically be via sprinkling.

10:3 Manna.

10:4 Water from the Rock (Exodus 17, Numbers 20).

10:5 Paul was making sure no one in the audience had fallen short like in Hebrews 4:1-3. (Implying loss of salvation for actual believers here would be calling Jesus a liar in John 4:14, John 6:58, etc.) Paul’s mission was to preach to the Gentiles so that the Jews might be saved (Romans 11:13-14), so he encouraged the Corinthians to preserve the value of their witness (like 2 Corinthians 6:3) toward that end.

10:6 Remember, this is about Corinthians still eating at pagan temples that had temple prostitutes. Idols, sexual immorality, and disrespecting God were all forbidden under the pikuach nefesh exceptions, the Laws of Noah, etc.

10:7 in Exodus 32:6.

10:8 See Numbers 25:1,2,9. Since the Golden Calf was referenced in verse 7, some say that the 23,000 were killed due to that incident (which does not specify a death toll). Others emphasize that 23,000 fell “in one day” and that the 24,000 of Numbers 25:9 was cumulative for the incident. Or, Paul wasn’t having his best day at the office – 1 Corinthians 1:14 with the self-correction in 1 Corinthians 1:16 shows that there can still be “errors” in a work that is inspired when viewed in its entirety (2 Corinthians 3:16-17, so make sure to read it “all”).

10:9 See Numbers 21:4-9.

10:10 See Numbers 16:41-50 and Job 2:9. The Jeremiah 44:16-18 mindset was tempting under persecution.

10:11 The Old Testament deaths Paul referenced demonstrated the behavior God dislikes, and you are His child.

10:12-13 “fall” into idolatry, grumbling against God, etc. Remember 1 Corinthians 1:8-9.

10:14 “Therefore” This word identifies that Paul was coming to his point. Flee from idolatry.

10:17 “One Loaf” The Bread of Life, Jesus (John 6:35), Whom your various wafers and such represent.

10:18-20 The idols were considered to be representative of fake gods and therefore nothing in Chapter 8, but Paul still has concern for the weaker brother’s mindset (1 Corinthians 8:9). See Deuteronomy 32:17 (and 1 Enoch 19:2 for bonus points).

10:21-22 “the table” The grocery store of demons (verse 25), however, was fine. Consider the size of Paul’s abstraction.

10:23 You are free. You are free to be miserable if you choose sin, because that’s not who you are any more.

10:24 “their own good” only and “the good of others” as well are implied, otherwise we’d starve to death handing the same piece of cake back and forth to each other.

10:25 Paul was a former Pharisee used to putting fences made of made-up rules around God’s rules to avoid breaking them. After hanging out with the risen Christ, Paul was done with that approach. Even with the Acts 15:20 rules, Paul allowed pretty much everything that wasn’t explicitly prohibited. He took “food sacrificed to idols” to mean food witnessed to be as such during a pagan ceremony.

10:26 See Psalm 24:1. God owns everything. As co-heirs with Christ, it’s all ours too. Like music? God even owns the guitar solos (1 Corinthians 4:7).

10:27 Don’t overthink stuff. If you have religious anxiety about activities not covered by the Council at Jerusalem’s ruling in Acts 15:20, you may be listening to the Accuser.

10:28-30 This is just a concern for the weaker brother. Balance this with Colossians 2:16, which is about not taking guff from ignorant alleged religious leaders.

10:31-33 In other words, Love. Be considerate. Don’t insist on drinking when around people struggling with sobriety, etc. You’re the only Bible most people around you will ever read. Christianity gets enough bad press as it is. However, attempting to educate a “weaker brother” about the freedom they actually have isn’t wrong, because otherwise Paul would have sinned by writing 1 Corinthians, Romans, Galatians, etc.

11:1 See Philippians 2:1-18. We are criticized for understanding Jesus’ teachings through the lens of Paul, but that is exactly Paul’s function for us Gentiles. See 1 Corinthians 4:16-17, Philippians 3:17, Philippians 4:9, 1 Thessalonians 1:6, and 2 Thessalonian 3:7-9. I stop short of imitating Paul in wishing that the modern Judaizers that prefer to use mishnah from Christ-denying Pharisees to explain Jesus and Paul to us would harm their own genitals (Galatians 5:12), but we all stumble in many ways (James 3:2). To be clear, that would be me stumbling by looking askance at Paul, as all Scripture is inspired (2 Corinthians 3:16-17).

This next section deals with head coverings, which is a neglected topic in many congregations at the time of this writing. Any pastor that wants to make a quick buck can dust off 1 Corinthians 7 (and sometimes only 1 Corinthians 7) and crank out a relationship book, but this somehow doesn’t seem to merit the same amount of attention. If this material about head coverings allegedly only belongs to a certain time and place, then…I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about the rest of the letters to the Corinthians. Then again, women wearing hats in church is still common worldwide and was also common in the West until the 1960s.

11:4 Roman pagan men pulled their robes or shawls over their heads to pray, and Christianity is distinct from world religions. However, surely Paul knew that the main worshiper under the Old Covenant, the high priest, wore a turban on duty (Exodus 28), lending credence to the veil interpretation for female head coverings.

11:5 Jewish women covered their hair after marriage to signify they were off-limits. Since Numbers 5:18 said to unbind a suspected adulteress’ hair, the default state was assumed to be bound. Whether they can uncover their hair at home and around which relatives this is permitted is still debated among Orthodox Jewish congregations. Since the early Church met in believers’ homes, what had been treated as private space became public space. This may be as simple as Paul telling women to cover their heads or be veiled in the setting of ancient Corinth in public worship gatherings so as not to give the impression that there were hetaira (whores – educated conversationalists welcome at parties for the elite, but whores) involved in the worship service (again, a concern for protecting their witness as in 1 Corinthians 9:27), ergo temple prostitution, or to keep the horny Corinthian dudes focused on the sermon. Regarding one who “prophesies”, Revelation 19:10 says that for us, prophecy is a clear witness for Jesus. Since women are allowed to do so means that 1 Corinthians 14:34-35 is to be understood in the context of not shouting across the aisle to her husband during a church service.

11:6 like a slave.

11:9 in Genesis 2.

11:10 Some say that a wedding ring is enough of a “sign of authority”. About the phrase “because of the angels”, the Watchers were tempted by beautiful human females (Genesis 6, Jude 6, 1 Enoch), the planet drowned, and the disobedient angels wound up chained, which is a fine bit of history to remember around ladies that are off-limits.

11:14 People who say this is about hair length say that the Nazirite case (Numbers 6:5, Judges 13:5, 1 Samuel 1:11, Acts 18:18) is an exception to the norm, like naked prophets (Isaiah 20, Micah 1:8). However, it seems that κόμα signifies hair as an ornament like the long styled tresses of a stereotypical supermodel whereas θρίξ is the usual word for hair. Paul’s issue appears to be with men trying to look like women for the purpose of being catamites (getting buggered).

11:16 “the churches of God” which shared a cultural context at that time. Paul was all about fitting in (1 Corinthians 9:20-23) and allowed his flock some freedom to decide matters for themselves (1 Corinthians 6:2,12; 1 Corinthians 10:15,23).

11:21-22 Here are more hints at famine. Just like in the Great Depression, some well-off people remained. The Lord’s Supper was celebrated with a full meal like a church potluck. This was the best meal poor Christians had all week. Certain people (perhaps the richer members that brought the food and drink) scarfed it all before others had a chance to celebrate what Jesus did for us.

11:24-26 Praying the Shema was done twice daily under the Old Covenant. Remembering that He died for you whenever eating food and drinking liquid is even more frequent. Christ instituted the Eucharist in remembrance of His once-for-all offering. A special/qualified celebrant is unnecessary. The New Covenant was promised in Jeremiah 31:31-34.

11:27 This isn’t about unworthy people with recent sins; we’re all unworthy, and that’s the point of grace. This is about consuming it in an unworthy manner, like stuffing yourself silly and getting hammered with the food and beverages meant for the rest of your congregation to commemorate Christ’s death for us.

11:28 Therefore, the self-examination is, “Am I being like the people in verses 20 through 22?”

11:29 While Leviticus 22:3,16 influenced the traditional thinking about this passage, the “judgment” is from the grumpy hungry congregation, aka the “Body of Christ”. See John 5:24.

11:30-32 Gluttony and alcoholism have earthly consequences.

11:33 They were still “brothers and sisters”; no one had been booted from the family. Eating together meant not outrunning the old widows to the buffet and cleaning it out before they had a chance.

11:34 Instead of trying to motivate modern Christians to undergo five minutes of mopey introspection prior to taking a cup of grape juice (that hopefully isn’t a cup of judgment), Paul summed this up by telling these particular offenders to have a snack at home so they wouldn’t scarf the potluck. You don’t have to qualify yourself to eat a meal that celebrates the fact that He already qualified you.

12:1-3 If you confess Jesus, you have the Spirit. “Hey Gentiles, y’all fell for knickknacks, so be careful when people try to convince you of things.” For the Jewish Christians in Corinth, this also meant that despite cultural/family ties or “good” works, their Christ-denying relatives were now less of a family to them than the smelly Gentiles sitting on the pew next to them. See 1 John 5:1, 1 John 4:1-3, and Galatians 3:13-14.

12:4-6 God picks your role (verse 11). Not every tool in the toolbox is used for every job or even every day. Not all believers speak in tongues. The gift of tongues and their interpretation are last on the forthcoming lists of spiritual gifts. Saying that only the gift of tongues is proof of salvation is like saying all believers have to have documented miraculous healings associated with them and that they have to be awesome at hospitality, too, to be saved. In Ephesians, we will see that the best evidence of the Spirit is love. 1 Corinthians 12:3 says that if you confess Him, you definitely have the Spirit.

12:7 See Ephesians 4:16. Gifts of the Spirit are given to help the rest of the Body of Christ for the glory of God.

12:9 “faith” In context, this would be special mountain-moving faith (1 Corinthians 13:2).

12:10 While Agabus predicted the future, Revelation 19:10 says that the essence of prophecy now is a clear witness for Jesus Christ, so basically regular preaching. The “tongues” we saw in Acts were existing human languages understood by their native speakers; it’s a gift for evangelism, as we’ll see spelled out more in this letter.

12:12-21 We’re all different, and that’s a good thing.

12:22-24 “seem to be…we think…unpresentable…presentable” Attitudes to nudity are a cultural concern. We were declared good as we were in Genesis 1. Genesis 3:11 is in part, “Who told you there was anything wrong with God’s Image?” Sin caused shame, and shame caused clothing. See Genesis 9:20-23 and Exodus 20:26 and their notes if you want the nuances. Being stripped (Acts 16:22) to be beaten was meant to be a shameful punishment, as well as nude crucifixion. While you are free since Christ took our sins and shame, as Christians we care what society thinks because we don’t want our perception to reflect badly on the Gospel (1 Corinthians 9:27, 1 Corinthians 10:33).

12:25-26 As I write this, I know I have brothers and sisters in Christ experiencing actual persecution in other countries. Jesus said we would have trouble (John 16:33), and “we” all do, for we are in this together. Please pray for our persecuted brethren and give material support to them if you are able.

12:27 You matter. Someone needs what you have, even if it’s just a smile, a joke, etc.

12:28 Notice that teaching (Exodus 35:34) ranks higher among the spiritual gifts than even miracles and healing. Tongues are still in last place. For “guidance”, see Proverbs 11:14.

12:29-30 The answer to this rhetorical question is no; we are all different.

12:31 To desire the greater gifts is to seek out and appreciate good preaching and teaching, since God assigns the spiritual gifts (verse 11).

Chapter 13 is what the puffed-up tongue-talking self-important Corinthians weren’t doing. They valued the spiritual gifts over the gifts’ purpose. Paul reached his point in 1 Corinthians 14:1.

13:1-3 “If” These next few verses begin with “if”, and since Paul didn’t move a mountain (verse 2), then the angel talk thing seems to be hypothetical as well. Having and experiencing God’s love makes the kind of service Paul described possible. Also, since God is Love (1 John 4:16), Love as a Person that you have living inside you is more transformative than mere tzedakah even to the extents of Matthew 19:21 and John 15:13 described here. “Works” don’t work. Several translations use language about being burned, showing us that cremation is okay.

Remember the attributes of love in this chapter with your spouse, in traffic, while having a political discussion, everywhere, etc.

13:4-7 God is Love (1 John 4:16), so God is patient toward me, God is kind toward me, God doesn’t keep track of my wrongs (Hebrews 8:12, Colossians 2:13-14), etc. God is not needy and is not trying to have a relationship with you to get something out of you. Realizing your own “okay-ness” thanks to the New Covenant enables the same mindset and behaviors.

13:8-10 History will end, and there will be nothing left to predict. There will be no more talking about God, because then the only people left will all know God.

13:11 This childishness is not the childlike dependency on God that Jesus taught us in Matthew 18, but the quarreling in 1 Corinthians 3:1-4 and 1 Corinthians 14:20.

13:12 “mirror” This would have been a bronze mirror with a worse reflection than you’re likely used to seeing. Experiencing God through His Image in other people isn’t on the level of how we’ll know Him after the end (1 John 4:20).

13:13 See Hebrews 11:1. Faith saves. However, faith and hope pertain to things we don’t see yet, but will (1 Corinthians 13:12). Eventually, only love remains.

14:1 All of Paul’s poetic discourse about love steers back to the Corinthians’ (mis)use of their spiritual gifts. Again, since God assigns the gifts (1 Corinthians 12:11), to desire the gift of prophecy is to seek out and appreciate good preaching.

14:2 “speak…to God” Which is to say, if one were to exercise the gift of tongues in a church service to say things in a language the audience does not understand, only God would know what was said.

14:3 Revelation 19:10 says that prophecy is a clear witness for Jesus. This kind of encouraging and building up the congregation sounds more like good preaching than fortune telling.

14:4 Someone using the gift of tongues without an interpreter in front of an audience that doesn’t know the language is only practicing their language skills. Verse 6 and verse 19 make it clear that a church service is the context, and your Bible perhaps has a heading like “Intelligibility in Worship” for Chapter 14. Paul clearly prefers encouraging, strengthening, and comforting the Church (verse 12). The gifts were given to us to help each other with them. Locking yourself in a prayer closet and babbling “private prayer language” or “angelic language” which sounds like nonsense syllables that happen to be derived from human languages you already know does not seem to be the activity this verse was given to us to encourage. As we saw in Job, the devil can neither read minds nor ultimately defeat God’s plans anyway, so a coded prayer language isn’t needed.

14:5 “every one…tongues…rather” The gift of tongues would be great for their evangelism efforts, but the fact that Paul would rather they prophesy means that it’s not a required proof of salvation. Paul sounds like Numbers 11:29.

14:10-11 Again, these seem to be actual human languages.

14:15 The Spirit prays for you if you don’t (Romans 8:26-27), whether you understand the prayer or not, so pray in a language you know – that way, your brain can pray, too. See the 1 Corinthians 14:4 note and Ephesians 5:18-19.

14:18 It is not surprising that the Apostle to the Gentiles was granted the ability to use their languages for evangelism.

14:19 “in the church” is the context.

14:20 Again, “children” as in 1 Corinthians 3:1-4.

14:21 See Isaiah 28:11-12.

14:22 The gift of tongues is for evangelism among those that speak that language (and for unbelieving Jews that know Isaiah 28 and see God at work in this way). The “believers” in this verse are more like “those who will believe” once Paul gets to verses 24 and 25.

14:23 This sounds like Acts 2:13 unless you know at least one of the languages. This chaotic scenario has kept at least one person from accepting a ticket to Heaven, at least on the day they visited a church where this sort of thing was going on. The person I’m thinking of is kind, generous, honest, etc., and seemed like the same sort of conversion candidate as Cornelius in Acts. Now, she thinks we’re all out of our minds. I’m not saying she’ll never accept Christ, but why do churches do the opposite of what Paul said to do in his letters?

14:24-25 like in Zechariah 8:23 and Isaiah 45:14.

14:32-33 The Spirit does not treat Christians like the people that were trying to kill David in 1 Samuel 19. The “ecstatics” that spin on the ground like Shemp Howard and moan as if they can’t help it appear to be getting their stuff from a different dealer than Paul’s.

14:34-35 Here, it is noteworthy that in Orthodox congregations and in the synagogues of that time and place, men and women sat on opposite sides of the aisle. Paul, in a section about orderly worship, said here that wives weren’t to interrupt the sermon by yelling questions to their husbands across the room. We’ve already seen women capable of praying and prophesying in this letter in 1 Corinthians 11. There are those who ignore that and use 1 Timothy 2:11-15 to establish a hierarchy of God > man > woman > child > unbeliever to say that women can witness but not teach. However, throughout the Bible I’ve made it a point to highlight women in legitimate leadership roles including prophecy, teaching, ordering killings, etc. See Judges 4, 2 Kings 22, 2 Chronicles 34, and 2 Samuel 20. Deborah, Huldah, the wise woman of Abel Beth-maacah, Priscilla (Romans 16:3), Junia (Romans 16:7), etc., make a prohibition of women addressing a church in any capacity unlikely. We’ll deal with the 1 Timothy section when we get there. P.S. I’m a dude with very short hair, and I’m an ordained minister registered with the county clerk, no less.

15:1-2 “gospel” as seen in verses 3 and 4.

15:3-7 Paul was taught by Christ directly and later double-checked his understanding of the teachings with the original apostles (Galatians 2:2-10). These verses also contain the sort of thing Paul could have “received” at his baptism. Of “first importance” is that Christ died for our sins and rose again, as predicted by Isaiah 53, Hosea 6:2, Psalm 16:10, etc. Paul listed Peter first because of how some of the Corinthians highly valued Peter (1 Corinthians 1:12).

15:10 It’s amazing how grace works. If you know who you are and Whose you are, working like an Arminian and sleeping peacefully like a Calvinist who thinks they’re among “the elect” comes naturally.

15:12 Paul used to be a Pharisee. Sadducee-esque Epicurean influence seems to be the problem here per verse 14. A different error with similar results is seen in 2 Timothy 2:17-18, in which people thought they had missed the General Resurrection. In Leviticus 23, the firstfruit hallows the whole crop. Since the General Resurrection was thought to be all at once, dead people rising as seen in Matthew 27:52 (a sign like Lazarus’ return or the resuscitations performed by Old Testament prophets, not the incorruptibility we wait for) troubled some people.

15:17 We were justified at the Cross, but we are saved by the Resurrection: His life (Romans 5:9-10, 1 Peter 1:3-5). Remember John 3:3.

15:22 When Adam chose sin, it’s like he left the Garden to move there. Humanity, all contained within our progenitor, has been born in sin (“in Adam”) since, like being born in a prison camp. Jesus did everything necessary for us to choose to live with Him in a much better place (“in Christ”). See John 17:20-26

15:23 See 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18.

15:24-25 like Psalm 110:1 and Revelation 20. The Good Shepherd will deal with the bad shepherds. Human governments and gods (and the fallen angels running it all) will all go away.

15:26 like Psalm 8:6.

15:29 “baptized for the dead” Remember, Paul carried their error to the logical conclusion that they must have thought that Christ had not been raised (verses 13 and 14).

15:31 This admission by Paul isn’t about “dying daily” to self, a popular unbiblical notion these days (why try to kill off what God gave new birth to?), but about constantly risking his life spreading the Gospel.

15:32 See Isaiah 22:13; Paul’s quote here is the stereotypical Epicurean motto. While literal wild animals aren’t out of the question, the two-legged variety might have been the problem (Acts 20:19,30).

15:33 Paul quoted the Greek poet Menander. Finding true things that your audience already believes can be a bridge.

15:34 “stop sinning” by acknowledging the risen Lord (John 16:9).

15:35 See also 2 Corinthians 5:1-9. There’s also this bit from 1 Enoch 49: “In those days, the saints and the chosen will undergo a change. The light of day will rest upon them, and the splendor and the glory of the saints will be changed.” However, the people Paul said were asking the question were likely influenced by Platonism to the extent that they thought the body was a prison for the soul and didn’t care for the idea of being resurrected physically to spend eternity.

15:36 like John 12:24.

15:37 What is sown is perishable (1 Corinthians 6:13), and what is raised is imperishable (1 Corinthians 15:54), but God lives in our perishable bodies even now, so avoid things like ritual sex with temple hookers.

15:44 The resurrected Jesus was touched by Thomas. The resurrected Jesus ate food. A “spiritual body” is still material, like the angels that Abraham fed before the burning of Sodom. Might Paul have chosen this phrase to be more palatable to a Plato-influenced audience? Jesus was mistaken for an ordinary gardener and also for an ordinary man on the way to Emmaus, so our new bodies don’t seem to be covered with eyes or have various animal faces etc., like we saw for heavenly creatures in the prophets. As for why we have to wait for it, in addition to the new physical reality we have coming, think about this: if you replaced a broom’s brush and handle simultaneously, would it still be the same broom? Would replacing everything about us all at once amount to simply destroying us altogether and replacing us with an entirely unrelated alternative person with the same name?

15:45-46 See Genesis 2:7. The dirt to make Adam came first, but then God breathed.

15:47-48 Christ existed before Adam, but He descended into the grave before He ascended to Heaven in the form we will share with Him (Ephesians 4:8-9).

15:49 See Genesis 5:3.

15:50 “flesh and blood” meaning these bodies that are part of a fallen world (1 Corinthians 6:13) that will be replaced.

15:52 “trumpet” like Numbers 10:7 assembling us, Leviticus 25:9-10 proclaiming freedom, Isaiah 27:13 calling us home, etc. See 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17. This will be the last trumpet for us, not the last trumpet of Revelation. After a bunch of ominous honking, there’s Zechariah 9:14 signaling His return. See Revelation 19:11-21; we’re riding in with Him.

15:53 Believers have this covered (Galatians 3:27, John 17:20-23). Our new bodies won’t be susceptible to the influence of Sin. Sin leads to death. If death is defeated, so is Sin (verses 56 and 57). Our being changed before the Last Judgment would even pass the Ezekiel 18:21 test if we were under the Old Covenant

15:54 See Isaiah 25:8. Sadness will be gone, too.

15:55 See Hosea 13:14.

15:56-57 Sin leads to death (Romans 6:23). If death is defeated, so is Sin. The Law increases sinning (Romans 7:5), and Sin is dead apart from the Law (Romans 7:8). Trying and failing to follow the Law is cursed (Galatians 3:10), for it is an all-or-nothing proposition (James 2:10) that we are not under (Galatians 3:23-25, Romans 6:14). We have died to the Law (Romans 7:4), and Christ is the end of the Law for all who believe (Romans 10:4).

15:58 What would you do if you were perfectly clean (1 Corinthians 6:11, Hebrews 10:10,14) and close to God (John 17:20-23, 1 Corinthians 6:17, Ephesians 2:6) already? Please do that. Some pastors start the sermon here with “stand firm” as an exhortation to stay right with God by doing a bunch of religious works. Stand firm in your assurance based on what Paul just said in the verses right before this one. Let nothing move you from your assurance, because you cannot be moved (John 10:28). You can always give yourself fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor is not in vain. You know this, because He did everything to save you (verse 57). Instead of being “in full-time ministry to yourself” trying to stay right with God, accept your victory and help others.

16:1-4 Agabus predicted a famine (that might also have tempted someone to eat all the Communion wafers like in Chapter 11) in Acts 11:28. See John 13:34-35. This collection comes up again in 2 Corinthians 8. Based on Paul’s temperament, this whole section would read more like “love your enemies” if the Tubingen people that say Paul and James led rivaling religions weren’t wrong.

16:11 “contempt” Timothy was young for an “elder” (1 Timothy 4:12).

16:13-14 “faith…love” Believe and Love, again.

16:20 Men kissing each other has different connotations in different historical and cultural contexts, in case anyone is still hashing out the head coverings issue from Chapter 11 in their congregation.

16:22 “Maranatha!” or “Come, our Lord!” is a traditional expression among we who eagerly await His return.

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