B. Lawsuits (6:1–11)
B. Lawsuits (6:1–11)
Some of the Corinthians were going to law with one another. Paul rebukes them for this (1–6), and then for actually defrauding one another (7–8); he goes on to speak of the kind of conduct that excludes people from the kingdom of God (9–11).
1. Paul recognizes that disputes will occur, but these should be settled within the brotherhood. He uses a strong word for dare (cf. Héring, ‘has the audacity’); it is far from the conduct looked for in believers. Dispute (pragma) is common in the papyri in the sense ‘lawsuit’ (MM). The ungodly (adikoi, the ‘unjust’ or ‘unjustified’) means those outside the church. Paul is not saying that the secular courts in Corinth were corrupt, but that they were composed of unbelievers. Such courts did not regulate their thinking or actions by the law of God. He is not complaining that believers would not obtain justice in heathen courts, but saying that they had no business being there at all. This was a principle to which the Jews adhered firmly. We read in the Talmud, ‘R. Tarfon used to say: In any place where you find heathen law courts, even though their law is the same as the Israelite law, you must not resort to them’ (Gitt. 88b; the Qumran community had a similar law, Millar Burrows, The Dead Sea Scrolls [Secker & Warburg, 1956], p. 235). Paul says Christians should do no less.
2. Paul’s Do you not know …? occurs six times in this chapter; it emphasizes that the Corinthians should know better than to do what they are doing. That the saints will assist in the final judgment of the world goes back to the teaching of Jesus (Matt. 19:28; Luke 22:28ff.); indeed it occurs in Old Testament prophecy (Dan. 7:22). There is no passage where Jesus explicitly says that all believers (the saints) will share in the judgment, but Paul appeals to it as well known. The reference to angels (v. 3) shows that the world (kosmos) has the same wide sense as in 4:9, the entire universe of intelligent beings. Some hold that judge is to be taken in the Hebraic sense of ‘rule’. This is possible, but the context deals with lawsuits, not government. Cases translates kritēriōn, a word which signifies ‘a means of judging, test, criterion’, then ‘a tribunal, law-court’ (AS, who notes that the meaning ‘law-case’ is ‘doubtful’). ‘Court of justice’ is a frequent meaning in the papyri (MM). Here the sense will be, ‘are you unworthy to judge in the least important courts?’ (so Bruce, Barrett, and others).
3. Angels is without the article, which directs attention to their quality or character. They are by nature the highest class of created beings. Yet the saints will judge them. Accordingly the Corinthians should have realized that they were quite capable of judging the things of this life. This translates one Greek word, biōtika, which means the ordinary things of common life. How much more (mēti ge) is a strong expression, occurring only here in the New Testament. The conclusion is inescapable.
4. The if-construction (ean with the subjunctive; contrast ei with the indicative in v. 2) carries the delicate implication that such lawsuits should not arise. Disputes is kritēria (see on v. 2), and should be understood as ‘if you do have courts’ (Barrett), though several translations agree with NIV. At the end of the verse NIV takes the verb as imperative, appoint as judges; it is then a direction to the community to appoint judges from among their own number, and in doing so to choose men of little account in the church. This would indicate contempt for the judicial process—even ‘the despised’ (so the expression is translated in 1:28) are good enough for that! But it is questionable whether Paul really regards judges in this way, and it is not easy to think that he would seriously call any believer ‘despised’. It is better to take the words as a question: ‘how can you entrust jurisdiction to outsiders, men who count for nothing in our community?’ (NEB; so RSV, Conzelmann, etc.). In accepting Christ believers deliberately rejected the standards of the world. It is completely out of character for them to go to law by such worldly standards and to submit to the judgment of ‘men who count for nothing’ among them.
5. ‘I say to you, “For shame!” ’ (Orr and Walther). Earlier Paul was not writing to shame his readers (4:14), but it is different here. It appears from his treatment of wisdom at the beginning of the letter that the Corinthians prided themselves on their wisdom. But now the apostle can ask whether they have even one wise man among them. To judge is an aorist infinitive with the meaning ‘to give a decision’ (rather than ‘conduct a trial’). The word implies not litigation, but ‘an amicable settlement by means of arbitration’ (Grosheide). Between believers is really ‘between his brother’, where we should supply ‘and another’; NIV misses the point that it is ‘brothers’, people who should be united, who are in dispute.
6. A string of argumentative questions is typical of Paul’s style, and this may be another in the chain, ‘Does brother go to law …?’ (NIV’s instead is not in the Greek). The question is broken with and this. It is extraordinary that brother should want to go to law with brother at all. But if he did, it was even more extraordinary that he should do so before unbelievers. This last word is without the article: it is their quality as lacking faith to which Paul draws attention.
7. To go to law with a brother is a defeat in itself, whatever the outcome of the legal process. You have lawsuits might be translated ‘you get judgments (krimata)’. The gaining of the verdict matters little. The cause is already lost when a Christian institutes a lawsuit. The injurious effects are implied in the expression ‘among yourselves’; the injury is to the body of Christ, not to outsiders. More biting questions drive home the point that a real victory might be obtained rather by choosing to be wronged, to be cheated. Jesus taught his followers to turn the other cheek, and, when sued at law for their tunic, to yield up their cloak as well (Matt. 5:39–40), and he set them an example (1 Pet. 2:23). But the Corinthians were far from basic Christian principles. Indeed, they were far behind the best Greek thought, for Plato can say that it is better to suffer wrong than to do wrong (Gorgias 509C).
8. They were even farther away than all this implies. Not only were they not ready to suffer wrong, but they were actively doing wrong, defrauding their fellows. Sharp practice is not uncommon in society at large, but there is no place for it among Christians. The addition to your brothers does not imply that the sin was not very serious when committed against unbelievers. It is serious no matter who is wronged. But the Christian, besides exercising love towards all people, must exercise ‘love of the brothers’. Those in Christ have a special care for one another. The Corinthians were thus committing a double sin. They were sinning against ethical standards, and they were sinning against brotherly love.
9–10. Paul again appeals to what is common knowledge (see on v. 2). Wicked lacks the article in Greek, thus putting emphasis on the character of these people, not the unrighteous as a class. The word God immediately follows wicked in the Greek; the two are set in sharp contrast. Wicked people cannot be found in that kingdom that is the kingdom of God (see on 4:20). Inherit, as often in the New Testament, is not used in the strict sense, but with the meaning ‘enter into full possession of’. Paul proceeds to list ten forms of evil that are incompatible with the kingdom, six being repeated from 5:11. He adds adulterers and two words denoting the passive and active partners in homosexuality. The inclusion of idolaters in a part of the list stressing sexual vice may point to the immorality of much of the heathen worship of the day. The second part of the list puts the emphasis on sins against others. Thieves (kleptai) are petty pilferers rather than brigands. For the other offenders see the notes on 5:10–11. Paul’s point is that people who practise such vices have no part in the kingdom of God.
11. The tremendous revolution brought about by the preaching of the gospel comes out in the quiet words, And that is what some of you were. It was no promising material that confronted the early preachers, but people whose standards were of the lowest. It had required the mighty power of the Spirit of God to turn people like that away from their sins, and to make them members of Christ’s church. Three times Paul uses the strong adversative alla, but, to stress the contrast between the old life that they had left, and the new life in Christ. The first verb, rendered you were washed, is in the middle voice, and while some take it as equivalent to a passive (as NIV), it is better to retain the middle force, ‘you got yourselves washed’ (as in Acts 22:16). It may be, as many recent commentators think, that this refers to baptism, but if so, it will be the inward disposition and not the outward action that the verb denotes. But there is nothing in the context to point to baptism and Paul may have in mind a metaphorical washing (cf. ‘To him who loves us and has washed us from our sins by his blood’, some MSS of Rev. 1:5). The prefix apo points to the complete washing ‘away’ of sins. The tense is past, the aorist referring to one decisive action. You were sanctified is in the same tense and will here indicate God’s act in setting them apart to be his. You were justified is another aorist; it looks back to the time when they were accepted as just before God. It is a legal term used of acquittal, ‘reckon as righteous’, ‘declare righteous’, ‘acquit’. Paul uses it for the act of God whereby, on the basis of Christ’s atoning death, he declares believers to be just, and accepts them as his own. It is unusual to have a reference to justification following one to sanctification. There may be a certain emphasis on the character involved in sanctification. Or, as Calvin held, all three verbs may refer to the same thing, though from different angles.
The name brings before us all that is implied in the character of the Lord, while the full title, the Lord Jesus Christ, brings out the dignity of him whom we serve. To this is joined the Spirit of our God. There is a power manifest in Christian living, and that power is divine, given by the very Spirit of God. Notice what has been called the ‘unobtrusive Trinitarianism’ of these words. It was from such statements that the doctrine of the Trinity would in due course develop.