2. Not due to Paul (1:13–17)
2. Division In The Church (1:10–4:21)
A. The fact of division (1:10–17)
1. The parties (1:10–12)
10. The adversative conjunction de, ‘but’ (which NIV omits) sets what follows in contrast to the preceding. So far from fellowship being realized there is division. Paul leads into the subject with a tender appeal. He uses the verb appeal, and the affectionate address, brothers, a word he will use thirty-nine times in this letter, far and away the most frequent use in any of his letters (next are Romans and 1 Thessalonians, each with nineteen). Further, he implores them in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. The full title heightens the solemnity of his appeal and the one name stands over against all party names.
That all of you agree (more literally, ‘speak the same thing’) makes use of a classical expression for being united. The use of party cries always tends to deepen and perpetuate division and Paul calls for their abandonment. To ‘speak the same thing’ can be a first step to real unity, whereas catch cries promote division. Divisions (schismata) are not ‘schisms’, but ‘dissensions’ (‘cliques’, Moffatt). The divisions were internal, and the groups were still one church and, for example, still met for Holy Communion (11:17ff.). Paul looks for them to be perfectly united, where his verb is used of restoring anything to its right condition. It is used of mending nets (Matt. 4:21), and of supplying what is lacking in the faith of the Thessalonians (1 Thess. 3:10). The condition of the Corinthian church was far from what it should have been. Restorative action was demanded. Paul looks to them to come to be perfectly united in mind and thought. The two words do not differ greatly, but mind may mean ‘frame of mind’ and thought ‘opinion’.
11. Chloe is not otherwise known. As Paul mentions her name it is perhaps more likely that she was an Ephesian than a Corinthian, but we do not know. Nor do we know whether she was a Christian, though this may be judged probable. She was evidently well-to-do, with interests in both Ephesus and Corinth, and some of her people had informed Paul of the situation. The verb means ‘made clear’. Paul was not left in any doubt. Possibly also the word ‘implies that the Apostle was reluctant to believe the reports which had come to his ears’ (Edwards). Quarrels are one of the ‘acts of the sinful nature’ (Gal. 5:19–21, there translated ‘discord’). They do not belong among God’s people.
12. Paul’s charge becomes precise. Clearly the trouble was widespread, and cliques had appeared, each attaching itself to a favourite teacher. Many try to outline the teachings of the various factions, but this is all guesswork. We have no information. From the general tone of Paul’s references to Apollos and from what we know of this disciple from other passages it is clear that there was no great difference in their teaching. Paul makes not one criticism of him, and he had urged him to return to Corinth (16:12). The choice would perhaps have been made on the basis of their methods of preaching (see Introduction, p. 25).
The Cephas party (Cephas is the Aramaic form of the name ‘Peter’) raises difficulties of another sort. We do not know whether Peter had ever been in Corinth or not. If he had been, the basis of attachment may have been personal. But there were other considerations. Peter had been a Christian longer than Paul. He had been the leader of the Twelve. He seems to have been more ready to conform to the Jewish Law than was Paul (cf. Gal. 2:11ff.). There may have been some different emphasis in his preaching from that of Paul, though if so it must have been slight. For whatever reason, a section of the Corinthians felt that there was something about Peter that made him the man to appeal to.
Some have thought that there was no Christ party, understanding I follow Christ as Paul’s own interjection. The construction of the sentence makes this most unlikely; the Greek seems to point to a fourth party, as does the question ‘Is Christ divided?’ (v. 13; is 2 Cor. 10:7 relevant?). Whether these people were simply tired of the other three, and so said ‘We belong to Christ, not any human leader’, or whether they had some distinctive teachings we have no way of knowing. Either way they had absorbed the spirit of partisanship. It is this that bothers Paul. He does not attack the teaching of any of the parties, but the fact that there were parties. He does not exempt those who clung to his own name. The whole thing was wrong. He would have none of it.
2. Not due to Paul (1:13–17)
13. The apostle’s indignation explodes in a series of questions. Is Christ divided? has been understood as an exasperated exclamation rather than a question (so GNB, NEB). Others take the verb as middle (as it is in Luke 12:13), which would give the sense, ‘Has Christ shared (you) with others?’ and indicate that part only of them had been devoted to Christ. But the passive seems much more likely. This could mean ‘Has Christ been apportioned?’ (i.e. to one of the conflicting groups; cf. Moffatt, JB, ‘Has Christ been parcelled out?’), or, ‘Has Christ been divided up?’ This last is the most likely meaning, but whichever we adopt Paul is envisaging an utter impossibility. Christ is one, and the church, which is his body, must be one.
Was Paul crucified for you? also points to the unthinkable, and goes to the heart of the Christian way. The Corinthians, with their emphasis on wisdom, seem to have overlooked the truth that Christ’s cross is absolutely central. No other than he could accomplish the crucial work of redemption. The third question shows that they had not realized the significance of their baptism (baptism and the cross are connected again in Rom. 6:3ff.). They had been baptized into Christ, not into any man. Their allegiance was to Christ alone.
14–16. Paul had baptized very few of the Corinthian converts, and he regards this as providential. He thanks God for it. Some think that baptism established a ‘mystic relationship’ (Héring) between baptizer and baptized, but it is not easy to establish this in the New Testament. Christ himself delegated baptism to his followers (John 4:1–2). Peter seems to have done this too (Acts 10:48). Paul had made exceptions in the cases of Crispus (‘the synagogue ruler’, Acts 18:8), Gaius (his host, Rom. 16:23), and the household of Stephanas (the mention of the latter after a little interval is a natural touch in a dictated letter). It is unlikely that this was done on account of the importance of these people, for ‘this idea would contradict the very drift of the whole passage’ (Godet). Paul does not disclose his reasons. There may have been a few others (v. 16), but clearly it was well known that it had not been Paul’s practice to baptize.
This fact makes it clear that he had made no attempt to bind converts to himself personally (cf. v. 15). The ‘name’ in antiquity meant far more than it does with us. It stood for the whole personality; it summed up the whole person. The preposition eis is literally ‘into’, and ‘ “Into the name” implies entrance into fellowship and allegiance, such as exists between the Redeemer and the redeemed’ (Robertson and Plummer). There could be no suggestion that Paul had said or done anything to bring his converts into such a relation to him personally. He had pointed people to Christ.
17. The essence of Paul’s commission was to preach the gospel, not to perform liturgical functions, even important ones like baptism. Preaching is primary in the original commission Christ gave the Twelve (Mark 3:14) and throughout the New Testament it is this that is primary in the work of the apostles. They had a unique place as the witnesses of God’s saving act in Christ. Their main business was to proclaim it.
Some at least of the Corinthians were setting too high a value on human wisdom and human eloquence in line with the typical Greek admiration for rhetoric and philosophical studies. In the face of this Paul insists that preaching with words of human wisdom (‘cleverness in speaking’, BAGD) was no part of his commission. That kind of preaching would draw people to the preacher. It would nullify the cross of Christ. The faithful preaching of the cross leads people to put their trust, not in any human device, but in what God has done in Christ. A reliance on rhetoric would cause trust in men, the very opposite of what the preaching of the cross is meant to effect.