4. On the Eating of Marketplace Food (10:23–11:1)

4. On the Eating of Marketplace Food (10:23–11:1)

7But not everyone possesses this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat sacrificial food they think of it as having been sacrificed to a god, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. 8But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.

9Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak. 10For if someone with a weak conscience sees you, with all your knowledge, eating in an idol’s temple, won’t that person be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? 11So this weak brother or sister, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. 12When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall.

With this paragraph Paul returns to the qualification of the way of knowledge with which he began (vv. 1–3), but now by way of the practical qualification of the content of knowledge that followed (vv. 4–6). Even though “we all possess knowledge,” not all believers share that “knowledge” in an experiential way. For some their former life as pagans, in which they at least acknowledged (if not totally believed in) the gods, continues to inform their experience in the present (v. 7). Thus they have “weak consciences,” and their attendance at the cultic meals would—or does—have the effect of “destroying” them. The first reason Paul gives, therefore, as to why the Corinthians may not go to the temples is that such activity may lead to the destruction of a fellow believer for whom Christ died (vv. 10–12).

To get from the concern with which he began (v. 7) to the ramifications that follow (vv. 10–12), Paul takes up the next point of the Corinthian argument, with which he fully agrees, that food is a matter of indifference to God (v. 8). But precisely because this is so, they must not use it as they are doing, to insist on “rights” and “freedom.” Rather, they must move in the opposite direction, not letting “rights” cause the fall of a brother or sister (v. 9). With the concrete example of temple attendance (v. 10) he makes an impassioned plea for the cause of the weak (vv. 11–12). The argument concludes (v. 13) by asserting the stumbling-block principle, in its broadest form, as the criterion for his own action, which serves at once both as paradigm and as the springboard for a vigorous defense of his own actions in such matters in the (only apparent) digression that follows (9:1–23).

It should be noted that despite the way the argument proceeds—food as a matter of indifference, the consideration of the weak conscience of another, the implication that they do have “rights” in this matter—the section as a whole has the net effect of prohibition. Some have asserted that if there were no “weak” brother or sister to see the action of those “with knowledge,” then the latter might participate in the cultic meals as they wished. But Paul’s ensuing argument (10:1–22) quite disallows such an interpretation. Thus the two sections (8:7–13; 10:1–22) indicate that going to the temples is wrong in two ways: it is not acting in love (8:7–13), and it involves fellowship with demons (10:19–22).

7 The strong adversative “but” indicates that Paul is about to qualify what has been said to this point. The present section (vv. 7–13) spells out in detail the principle enunciated at the beginning (vv. 1b–3), that what builds up God’s people is love, not knowledge, and therefore that love is what true knowledge is all about. But he makes that point by way of the preceding theological affirmations (vv. 4–6), where he has already qualified the content of their knowledge by insisting that, despite the fact that idols do not really exist as gods, yet for them (i.e., pagans who believe in them) there are many “gods” and many “lords.” Thus, against the Corinthian insistence that “we all possess knowledge” (v. 1), Paul now asserts that “this knowledge is not shared by all.” As the rest of the sentence makes plain, by this he means that even though at the theoretical level all may believe that an idol does not represent a deity, not all equally share this “knowledge” at the experiential, emotional level.

Some of the Corinthian believers are among those for whom the “gods” and “lords” were experienced as a genuine reality while they were pagans. Such people are thus “still accustomed to the idol”; that is, even though they now know that the god does not exist, their former association with the deity as a god is still a part of their experience of reality. They may tell their heads all they want that the god is only an idol and that an idol has no genuine reality. The fact is that their former way of life is woven into their consciousness and emotions in such a way that the old associations cannot be thus lightly disregarded. For them to return to the place of their former worship would mean once more to eat “as though it were truly being sacrificed to the god.” This seems to make the best sense of the phrase, (lit.) “they eat as though it were idol food.” The NIV implies that they are eating food that had formerly been sacrificed (thus marketplace food), and that their former idolatrous associations would carry over to this food. But that is to assume that Jewish scruples were promulgated among these Gentile Christians. Paul’s language makes far more sense if they are in fact eating the food in the temple precincts, in which case the phrase means not “that they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol,” but that “they eat it as something actually being sacrificed to a ‘god,’ ” just as it had been all their former years.

The final result of such people’s return to the temples is that “since their conscience is weak, it is defiled.” This clause introduces the two key words (“conscience” and “weak”) for the argument that follows. Unfortunately, the precise nuance of the word “conscience” is not easy to capture, nor is it clear from whom at this point the term derives—from the Corinthian letter or from Paul himself. This is its first occurrence in the NT; it is one of the few items in Paul’s theological vocabulary that seems to have come from his Greek rather than Jewish background. Because of its frequency in this passage and the concluding “wrap-up” (10:25–29) whereas it does not appear elsewhere in 1 Corinthians, and because it is not used in the somewhat comparable discussion in a later letter (Rom. 14), many have argued that the term comes from the Corinthians themselves. This may very well be; however, since Paul uses the term elsewhere in a variety of ways, one should probably proceed with due caution here.

In any case, the greater issue is what the word would have meant for them. In contemporary popular parlance it refers to a kind of inner moral referee that pronounces on the rightness or wrongness of one’s actions (as in “Let your conscience be your guide”). Although this comes close to Paul’s own usage in some later passages (Rom. 2:15 and 13:5), in the present case the word seems to be closer to its root meaning of “consciousness” as to one’s own actions (cf. the verb in 4:4), with a decided moral overtone to that consciousness. Thus “moral consciousness” seems best to capture its sense here. The weakness involved is that their “intellectual conviction that there was only one God had not been fully assimilated emotionally.” Thus when encouraged to attend the cultic meals as a form of “edification,” they could not cope with the dissonance between their heads and their hearts, as it were, which would ultimately mean that they would have returned to idolatry and thus been destroyed (see on v. 11). In this way their moral consciousness is being “defiled,” that is, their past associations with idols meant that a return to the worship of the god by eating in the deity’s environs would cause them to defile their present relationship with Christ.

8 With a couple of sentences that are as puzzling as they are abrupt, Paul takes up the cause of those just mentioned as having “weak consciences.” The difficulties lie in determining both what the sentences mean and how they function in the argument. Part of the latter problem is related to whether they reflect ad hoc instruction from Paul about idol food, or whether they reflect a Corinthian position in some way.

The two sentences have the appearance of aphorisms, the second apparently intended to modify or elaborate the first. Thus: (1) “Food will not present us to God”; and (2) “We are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.” The meaning of the first sentence seems easy enough. Even though the verb can be either positive (“present us to God for approval”) or negative (“bring us before God for judgment”), the sense in either case is that food as such has nothing to do with our relationship to God. This, of course, would be the perspective of both Paul and the Corinthians. Indeed, what they may well have been urging in their letter is something they could easily have picked up from him.

The puzzle comes in the second sentence. The natural elaboration of sentence 1 would be, “therefore, abstaining is of no advantage to anyone; nor is eating of any disadvantage.” That is, food does not affect our lives one way or the other. So the abstainers, who would usually do so in order to gain God’s approval, will not be so advantaged; and those who indulge, who might fear God’s disapproval, will not be judged. But that is not what Paul says, despite the frequency with which it has been asserted. His elaboration is precisely the opposite: “The one who abstains is not disadvantaged; and the one who eats is not advantaged.” The problem is, How does this relate to sentence 1 as part of Paul’s response to the Corinthians who are challenging him, and especially as part of his taking up the cause of the “weak”?

The contextual problems are equally difficult. (a) Since the context (both vv. 7 and 9–12) does not have to do with “food” as such, but with food eaten in the presence of an idol, hence with idolatry, why is this said at all, and especially why right here? (b) Most striking of all is the admonition that comes next (v. 9), where Paul refers to these aphorisms as “this authority/freedom of yours,” as though what is said here (v. 8) is not instruction being given for the first time, but a position either for which they have argued or with which Paul knows they will be in agreement. (c) All of this is further complicated by the fact noted above that sentence 1 represents a point of view that can be easily shown to be either Paul’s or the Corinthians’.

A variety of solutions have been offered, none of which is totally satisfactory. If this is an ad hoc word from Paul, then the strange formulation of sentence 2 remains a problem, as does the apparent rebuttal that follows (v. 9). If this is a Corinthian statement, then the abruptness with which it is brought in, especially in light of how Paul (almost certainly) quotes them at the beginning (vv. 1 and 4), is equally puzzling, as is the formulation of sentence 2, which seems to be the exact opposite of what one might have expected them to have said.

The solution offered here is that despite the lack of signals, both sentences reflect what the Corinthians were arguing in their letter, whether they are direct quotations or not. The reason for the lack of quotation marks is that they also fully accord with Paul’s own point of view. The key lies with the word “food,” which appears again in the conclusion (v. 13) and elsewhere in Paul only in his letter to the believers in Rome (Rom. 14:15–20, where food laws seem to be in view) and earlier in the present letter (6:13), where it also appears as part of a Corinthian slogan (with which Paul was also in essential agreement). What needs to be noted is that what is said here about food is almost exactly what Paul says elsewhere about circumcision (7:19; Gal. 5:6; 6:15). Very likely this reflects Paul’s own position on being “kosher,” that food, like circumcision, does not “present us” to God. We are none the worse if we do not eat such food (as with not being circumcised) and we are no better if we do (as with being circumcised). Such are strictly matters of indifference to God. For Paul this would still be true, hence the positive way the aphorisms are presented. This is the “authority/freedom” of the person in Christ. In this view, the Corinthians have picked up one of Paul’s own words from a different area and are pressing it to their own purposes; such “freedom,” they have argued, can also be applied to the eating of any food, in any circumstance, including the idol temples. For Paul this is the wrong use of “freedom” in regard to food (v. 9)—first of all because of what it can do to a brother or sister (vv. 10–12).

9 This sentence makes it most probable that the preceding sentence represents part of their argument with Paul. He begins with an adversative conjunction (“but”), followed by the imperative of warning, “be careful.” The warning itself sets two words in contrast in such a way that one (“freedom”) seems to be the Corinthian view of their present activity, while the other (“stumbling block”) is Paul’s. On the crucial term exousia (“authority/freedom”) see the discussion on its first appearance (6:12). Again, it is almost certainly a Corinthian catchword (cf. also 10:23), and as before it means something close to “freedom to act as they please without restraint.” That this is their own word seems certain from the way Paul speaks of it as “your ‘rights.” Paul is thus warning them to take heed “lest this authority of yours” (promoted in the previous verse), and with which Paul would quite agree in the matter of food laws, be carried over to the eating of the cultic meals and thereby become not “freedom” for others but “a stumbling block” to them. For the Corinthians “knowledge” (= insight) meant “rights” to act in “freedom,” which for them apparently had become the highest good, since it led to the exaltation of the individual. For Paul the opposite prevails: “Love” means the “free giving up” of one’s “rights” for the sake of others (cf. 9:19–23), and “life together” in community is the aim of salvation.

As suggested earlier, latent within the nature of their “authority” is probably a desire to “build up” the “weak.” If so, then for Paul’s antagonists exousia is the crucial term. Not only do they want to “free” some of their brothers and sisters from what to them is their current bondage to false notions about the “gods” (which is the point of the specifics in the next verse), but also their view of exousia has led them to question Paul’s own apostleship and freedom, since he does not act with the boldness of such “authority” (which becomes the point of the defense in 9:1–23).

10 Having warned the Corinthians not to use their “rights” as the means by which “the weak” might fall, Paul proceeds in the next three sentences (vv. 10–12) to make an impassioned plea for the “rights” of the “weak.” He begins in this opening sentence by specifying in detail what they are doing that is bringing about such a fall. Even though the explanation takes the form of a present general supposition, the urgency of the argument suggests that we are dealing with a real, not a merely hypothetical situation. “For,” he explains with reference to the preceding admonition, “if anyone [meaning, as the NIV has it, the person with ‘a weak conscience’ referred to in the apodosis, exactly as in v. 7] sees you, with all your knowledge, eating in an idol’s temple, won’t that person be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols?”

From this question we learn at least three things about the situation in Corinth. First, those with the “knowledge” expressed three times (vv. 1, 4, and 7) are going to the cultic meals in the temple dining halls. Since this is the only specific expression of the problem in the present argument (chap. 8), and since this is still the major concern when “idol food” is picked up again later (10:1–22), it seems certain that this is the real issue for which they are arguing against Paul’s (apparently) former prohibition.

Second, at the same time they are probably encouraging (all?) others in the community to take their same “knowledgeable” stance on this matter. Hence they seem to be urging others, whom Paul describes as people whose consciences are weak (see on v. 7), to join them at these meals. This seems to be the best way to make sense of two other items in the text: (a) the fact that they “see” the “knowing ones” sitting at table (how could they “see” it if they were not present?); and (b) the ironic use of the verb “build up” with regard to the moral consciousness of the weak. Both of these are understandable if what is “destroying” them (v. 11) is the fact that they are under considerable pressure to accept—or have actually done so—the invitations of the “knowing ones.”

Third, the problem with the persons with weak consciences is not that they are “offended” by what the “gnostics” are doing. Rather, their “conscience” is being “built up” in such a way that they are being led also “to eat what is sacrificed to idols.” Thus the real problem for them lies in their inability to handle the “gnostics’ ” argument (cf. v. 7). They may indeed acknowledge that there is no reality to the idol, but what for the others is “food” only, is for them “food sacrificed to the idol.” It is not the food that destroys them, but the idolatry that is inherent in eating in the temple precincts. This is the item that will be picked up and spelled out in greater detail in the next sentence.

11 This sentence, which also begins with an explanatory “for” (NIV, “so”), elaborates the concern of the preceding sentence by indicating exactly what happens to the person with a “weak conscience” who would—or has—emulate(d) the one trying so to “build them up.” Such a person “is destroyed by your knowledge.” But the person is no longer merely “someone with a weak conscience”; they are a “weak brother or sister for whom Christ died.” Both the emphasis of the word order and the language suggest that for Paul the problem is not merely hypothetical. A Christian life is at stake—all for the sake of some Corinthian believers’ freedom informed by their knowledge. This anticipated—or actual—tragic result of the loss of a member of the family of believers puts into clearer focus several items from the preceding argument.

In saying that the brother or sister “is destroyed” Paul most likely is referring to eternal loss, not simply some internal “falling apart” because one is behaving contrary to the “dictates of conscience.” The latter idea is altogether too modern; and elsewhere in Paul this word invariably refers to eternal ruin. That seems to clinch the argument that real idolatry (i.e., eating cultic meals) is the issue at hand, not simply eating food that formerly had idolatrous associations. What is in view is a former idolater falling back into the grips of idolatry. Only one who takes seriously, as Paul did, the demonic character of idolatry (see 10:19–22) can appreciate the grip it has on the lives of those who are bound by its powers. For such people to return to idolatry meant to come back under its power and thus suffer eternal loss. This is why they are destroyed “by your knowledge”—not only because knowledge is the improper primary basis of Christian ethics but also because the “gnostics’ ” knowledge about idolatry itself is so defective. For such reasons one can now understand more clearly the nature of Paul’s argument to this point, especially since he appears to have felt impelled at every point to qualify their “knowledge.” Behavior that is based singularly on knowledge can lead to all the wrong actions. It not only fails to “build up” former idolaters; it destroys them—not to mention “puffs up” those insisting on “rights” and “freedom.”

Thus Paul appeals to love in two ways—even though he does not here use the word. First, the person being destroyed is a “brother or sister.” Here the interplay on love, knowledge, and building up comes into clear focus. They would “build up” the weak by their “knowledge”; what they do instead is “tear down.” Because the people involved are brothers and sisters, they must be built up in the proper way. This means no more insistence on “freedom” since “freedom” as such moves in the direction of individualized existence, while love moves in the direction of community and care for others. Second, the common basis of their life in Christ is not “knowledge” and “freedom” at all, but the death of Christ. Their arrogance and insensitivity, which would destroy a member of God’s family in the name of knowledge and freedom, are thus contrasted with Christ’s love “unto death.” As in his opening argument (chaps. 1–4), where Paul tries to combat their fascination with wisdom, he once more brings them back to the cross. Both their lives as individuals and together as a community are predicated on the fact that each of them is someone “for whom Christ died.”

12 This sentence brings closure to the present argument by giving a theological expansion of the point just made. “In this way,” that is, in the way described above (v. 10), they destroy a fellow believer for whom Christ died (v. 11). That is now expressed in terms of “sin.” On the one hand, their activity turns out to be “sin against your brothers and sisters,” expressed again in terms of “wounding their weak conscience.” On the other hand, so to sin against a brother or sister for whom Christ died is to “sin against Christ” himself. This calls to mind the language of Jesus, that to do something against one of the least of those who are Christ’s brothers or sisters is to do it against him (Matt. 25:45), or the language of Heb. 6:6, where to return to former sins is to crucify the Son of God all over again and hold him up to public disgrace. To wound a member of Christ is to wound Christ; to sin against one of Christ’s own is to sin against the One to whom the wounded person also belongs—a point seldom heard among later believers.

Because of the switch to the plural “them” (= “your brothers and sisters”) from the preceding singular, which returns again in the next sentence (v. 13), some have suggested that the sin is against the church. That is, this may very well reflect Paul’s understanding of the solidarity of Christ with his body. To sin against Christ thus means to destroy his body the church. In either case, the ultimate wrong of the “gnostic” is not simply that such a person lacks true knowledge, nor even that they are responsible for the loss of a member of Christ’s own family, bad as that is, but that in so doing they are directly sinning against Christ himself in some way. The net result of such an argument, of course, is ultimately prohibition.

13 With the strong inferential conjunction “therefore,” and a notable shift to the first person singular, Paul brings this opening argument to its conclusion, and thereby effects two concerns. First, he brings closure to the immediate argument by generalizing the preceding reference to the stumbling block (v. 9), but does so in terms of his own personal conduct—or at least his willingness to conduct himself henceforth in a certain way for the sake of “my brother or sister.” He does this by picking up his earlier language (v. 8, “food,” NIV “what I eat”), which he further narrows specifically to the flesh of animals. Thus, “if food is the cause of my brother’s or sister’s downfall, then I will never eat the flesh of animals again as long as I live, in order that I might not be the cause of their downfall.” But why does he generalize in this way? And why does he suddenly use his own conduct as an example of the principle?

The answer to the first question seems easy enough. He has been dealing right along with a form of “eating”; but since he generalizes in the first person singular (i.e., with reference to his own conduct), and since he would never have participated in the cultic meals as such, he must broaden the principle to refer to scruples about food in general, and animal flesh in particular. This suggests not only that he is truly generalizing and thus moving quite beyond the specific issue at hand (cultic meals), but also that in some ways the specific issue is only symptomatic of the much greater problem of their insisting on “rights” and “freedom” in the name of knowledge. Thus this conclusion summarizes with a kind of negative general principle the more positive principle with which the argument began (“Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up”). Love, that is, care for a believing brother or sister, determines Christian ethical life, not “freedom.” As Paul makes clear in coming passages (9:19–23 and 10:23–30), this does not mean that one’s personal life with regard to food per se is absolutized, but that the first consideration in ethical conduct is not my own “rights” but the good of the other.

Second, at the same time this generalizing conclusion as to his own conduct regarding food leads directly to the argument that follows. In what looks like a digression but is in fact a crucial part of the argument as a whole, Paul makes an impassioned defense of his apostleship, in which his freedom as an apostle to live as he does is the primary issue. The fact that this defense is set up by this concluding word suggests that his conduct with regard to food had become part of the issue they had raised in their letter.

But that is what the following argument (chap. 9) is all about. For now a final word needs to be said as to why Paul begins his response to their attendance at cultic meals in this fashion, rather than with the outright prohibition that eventually follows (10:14–22). The answer to that seems to be twofold. (1) This response has been determined first of all by the nature of the argumentation in their own letter. That is, Paul is not simply giving his opinion as to whether one may attend the cultic meals. He will finally say they may not—not under any circumstances. But he begins this way because this is how they began. Thus, as has been pointed out, he works his way through their argument point by point, and shows that Christian theology and ethics move in an entirely different direction from theirs. This is argument and appeal over against them, not instruction in response to a friendly inquiry.

(2) Responding in this way also perfectly fits the pattern throughout the letter (see, e.g., 1:10–4:21; 6:12–20; 12–14), where in each case he finally prohibits their present activity, but does so only after he has sought first to correct the problem at a deeper level, namely at the level of their misunderstanding of the gospel. This is also in keeping with his larger understanding of the gospel, that the imperative follows the indicative, that obedience there must be—which sometimes is finally expressed in absolutes (as in 6:18 and 10:14–22)—but always in terms of response to the gospel.

For this reason Paul invariably treats the imperative in a new way. The divine order still has moral and ethical absolutes; there is conduct that is totally incompatible with life in Christ. Sexual immorality is wrong—absolutely; idolatry is wrong—absolutely. But Paul never begins there. For the person in Christ such behavior is wrong first of all precisely because the person is “in Christ.” With Christ one has died; in Christ one has been raised to live a new existence. Such a participant in the new order must realize the fruit of the Spirit. Thus Paul begins with the gospel and its fruit of love and care for brothers and sisters. But he concludes finally (in 10:19–22) with personal conduct, and cultic meals are absolutely forbidden as totally incompatible with life in Christ.

Despite the fact that Western Christianity for over a millennium has had nothing in its culture comparable to this issue, this text has had a long history of use in the church in the form of the “stumbling-block principle.” But much that has been said in this regard would derive better from a later passage (10:31–11:1) or later letter (Rom. 14). A few items need to be noted.

(1) The issue is not that of “offending” someone in the church. It has to do with conduct that another would “emulate”—indeed, in this case apparently is being urged to emulate—to their own hurt.

(2) Usually this principle is invoked in more peripheral matters of behavior. But that, too, is not the case here. While it is true that at the end (v. 13) Paul broadens the scope considerably, the specific issue is something that he will eventually forbid altogether. Nonetheless, the greater issues for him in this section—the attitudinal ones—do need careful hearing: people arguing for certain kinds of behavior on the basis of knowledge and asserting their “authority/freedom” to the detriment of others.

(3) What would seem to be an illegitimate use of the principle, even in the broader terms of v. 13, is for those who feel “offended” to try to force all others to conform to their own idiosyncrasies of behavior. Paul makes it quite clear in Rom. 14 that on matters of indifference people within any given community should learn to live together in harmony, with no group demanding their own behavior of the others.

(4) The real concern of the passage needs a regular hearing in the church. Personal behavior is dictated not by knowledge, freedom, or law, but by love for those within the community of faith. Everything one does that affects relationships within the body of Christ should have care for brothers and sisters as its primary motivation.

Although what comes next is understandable in terms of both what is said and the nature of the outburst itself, nothing that has immediately preceded quite prepares the “outside” reader for either the following sudden burst of self-justifying rhetoric or the passion with which it is expressed. Granted that the preceding argument was carried on with some vigor, but it is hardly comparable to the outburst that begins, “Am I not free?” and is sustained for a whole leaf of papyrus (through v. 14), where one rhetorical question follows another without letup. Equally striking is the content itself. After an opening salvo in which Paul reasserts his apostleship (vv. 1–2), he sets out to defend himself against those who are calling him into question (v. 3). The “defense” turns out to be a vehement insistence on his “rights” to their material support (vv. 4–14). With every kind of available argument he contends that, “if others have this right of support from you, shouldn’t we have it all the more?” (v. 12a). Yet after all that, the conclusion (vv. 15–18) is not that they should therefore support him; it is the precise opposite—an explanation, indeed defense, of his policy of not accepting that for which he has just argued so strenuously. All of this is unusual argumentation from almost any point of view, and needs to be understood from within such a context.

This is then followed by an explanation (defense?) of Paul’s social behavior (vv. 19–23), which he freely admits differed according to setting (Jew or Gentile): he became all things to all people so as to win the more. At the end he turns again to exhortation (vv. 24–27), now urging self-discipline and concluding with himself as an example.

What is one to make of all this, especially in the context of forbidding the Corinthians to attend cultic meals? The traditional answer has been that it follows what has immediately preceded (8:13) as a further example of his willingness to give up his rights for the sake of others. Although Paul’s answer may partly function in that way, there are at least two difficulties with such a view as the basic reason for this section: (1) Apart from the concluding sentences (vv. 26–27), which seem to anticipate the historic examples to follow, the text gives no indication, expressed or otherwise, that Paul is appealing to them to follow his example. (2) At least one half of the response (vv. 1–14) does not fit this scheme in any way at all. To suggest that this opening cascade of questions merely sets up what follows (vv. 15–18), where he explains why he gave up these rights, scarcely accounts for the vigor of the rhetoric. Furthermore, the concluding explanation is so highly personal—and emotionally charged—that its first function does not seem to be that of setting an example; surely that could have been said in a more sanguine—and therefore winning—way.

More likely, as was suggested earlier, this is an integral part of his response to their letter. He had earlier forbidden attendance at the temples. They are challenging that prohibition, both by a set of theological arguments (8:1, 4, 8) and by calling into question his apostolic authority. From this response it would appear that the challenge came from two sources. First, his failure to accept material support is being played off against him, calling into question his apostleship itself (cf. 2 Cor. 12:13!). Second, on the matter of marketplace food eaten in a familial setting he had been known to be of two minds. He ate such food in Gentile settings, but he declined when among Jews (vv. 19–22). Such vacillation does not seem worthy of an apostle of the risen Lord.

Since a crisis of authority lies behind much of this letter (cf. 4:1–5; 5–6; 14:36–38), Paul takes an occasion that arose directly from their letter to hit it head-on. The defense is structured around the opening two questions, which he answers in reverse order: “Yes, I am an apostle” (vv. 1b–14); and “My apostleship makes me free both to give up my rights to your support” (vv. 15–18) and “to eat or reject food of any kind” (vv. 19–23). Most likely the crucial matter is his freedom to act as set forth in this final paragraph. But to get there he must first defend his apostleship itself, which he does with extraordinarily strong rhetoric.

1Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not the result of my work in the Lord? 2Even though I may not be an apostle to others, surely I am to you! For you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.

This rhetoric has been set up by the final sentence of the preceding argument (8:13). It is easy to overlook the shift to the first person in that sentence; but once Paul generalizes the principle in this way, it sets off an impassioned defense of his actions. Although the opening question is the crucial one for the context, and follows the preceding sentence most naturally, the matter of his apostleship itself gets first attention, since everything else hinges on that.

1 With unexpected vigor Paul suddenly unleashes a torrent of rhetorical questions, each beginning with the Greek particle ou (“not” = is it not so?), thus expecting a positive answer: “Of course I am; of course I have; of course you are.” The questions fall into their natural order in terms of the argument. The problem has to do with exousia (“authority/freedom”; see on 8:9) and eleutheros (being “free”)—not only theirs, but his, which is what the concluding paragraph (vv. 19–23) and an especially striking later moment (10:29b–30) are all about. Thus the first question is “Am I not free?” As what follows makes clear, this is not first of all an attempt to set himself up as an example of the proper use of “freedom” (which his response ends up doing in its own circuitous way); rather he sets out to defend his own actions. At the same time, whether intentional or not, Paul indicates that his apostleship corresponds to the gospel he preaches, a point he will make at the end of this most unusual apologia (v. 19). The second question, “Am I not an apostle?” is the one that gets immediate attention. This is the first direct statement in the letter indicating that his apostleship itself is at stake in Corinth; but such has been hinted at several times before this (1:1, 12; 4:1–5, 8–13, 14–21; 5:1–2).

Paul’s own view of apostleship is presented by the second set of questions, which serve to establish that he is indeed an apostle. First, “Have I not seen Jesus our Lord?” Along with a later similar affirmation (15:8), this question establishes two things: (a) Paul believed that his experience on the Damascus road was more than a mere vision. For him it was a resurrection appearance of a kind with all the others—to be sure, after the ascension and therefore out of due season (15:3–8). (b) But since others who saw the risen Lord did not become apostles, what most likely legitimized his apostleship was the accompanying commissioning. Although he does not say so here, in a later letter (Gal. 1:16) the revelation of the Son of God is accompanied by its purpose, “that I might preach him among the Gentiles” (cf. 15:8–11, where the resurrection appearance is followed by discussion of his apostleship).

Second, “Are you not the result of my work in the Lord?” (cf. 3:6, 10; 4:15). This is Paul’s second criterion for his apostleship, the establishing of churches in new areas (cf. Rom. 15:17–22). He will pick this up again in his next (preserved) letter to them (2 Cor. 10:13–16) over against the outsiders who had come in to trouble them. In Paul’s view such people were false apostles, partly because they were laboring in “another person’s territory.” His point here is that the Corinthians’ own existence authenticates his apostleship (cf. 4:15: many guardians but only one father). This point will now be further elaborated in the following two clauses.

2 Paul follows his opening salvo with this very ad hominem elaboration of the final question, and thereby the final three preceding questions, thus making it plain that the matter at hand is not simply Paul’s “freedom” (i.e., this is not an attempt to explain how an apostle can limit his freedom in the way described in 8:13); rather, his apostleship itself has been called into question. But what the reader is not quite prepared for is the reference to “others.” There are two possibilities: (1) It may refer to other Christians or other communities. That is, Paul may simply be allowing the hypothetical possibility that others outside their immediate circle may have some reason for not thinking of him as an apostle. This seems to be the implication of the NIV. Or (2) it may refer to some outsiders, such as those taken on in vigorous confrontation in his next preserved letter to them (2 Cor. 10–12), who have already entered the community and begun to sow seeds of discord.

From our distance this is not an easy decision, which is unfortunate, since the reconstruction of Paul’s relationship to this church rests in part on when the outsiders of the next letter made their appearance. Two suggestions may be made with a degree of certainty: First, from Paul’s perspective his present “critics” are from within the Corinthian community itself. There is no suggestion whatever in this letter implying that any of the differences between him and them are the result of outside agitation. This does not mean that such was not the case, but that Paul sees the problem strictly as an inside affair—as probably their letter gave him full warrant for believing. Yet, second, there are indications that others have visited the church. This emerges especially in the early recital of slogans (1:12), and perhaps in two other passages (4:15: “you have many guardians”; and 9:12: “if others share your exousia”). This latter passage seems to suggest outsiders of some kind. If so, then these may include some whom Paul suspects of doubting his apostleship. Thus, “If not to them, surely I am to you!”

Even so, as the following sentence (v. 3) and what has preceded much earlier (4:1–5) imply, the problem at this point is from within the community; and the argument here is directed at the church. “If others have doubts,” Paul says to them, “you dare not share such doubts because your own existence is the living evidence of my apostleship.” That is the point of the final sentence: “For you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.” Paul thus takes a common metaphor, the “seal” that indicates ownership or authentication, and applies it to their relationship to him. Their very existence authenticates his apostleship; they themselves function as the “seal” of his authenticity. As with the final question in the opening salvo, he adds “in the Lord.” Their existence “in the Lord” stamps Paul’s ministry with the divine seal of authenticity: it too is “in the Lord.” Although Paul does not make the point here as he will much later (chap. 15, esp. 12–19), their calling his apostleship into question therefore calls them into question as well. If he is not a true apostle, then they are not truly “in the Lord.”

Can anything be said in our day about “apostles”? Given the two criteria expressed here, one would have to allow that apostles do not exist in the sense that Paul defines his own ministry. But it should also be noted that this might be too narrow a view, based strictly on Paul’s own personal experience. His more functional understanding of apostleship (see on 1:1) would certainly have its modern counterparts in those who found and lead churches in unevangelized areas. Only when “apostle” is used in a non-Pauline sense of “guarantors of the traditions” would the usage be narrowed to the first century.

3This is my defense to those who sit in judgment on me. 4Don’t we have the right to food and drink? 5Don’t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Cephas? 6Or is it only I and Barnabas who lack the right to not work for a living?

7Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat its grapes? Who tends a flock and does not drink the milk? 8Do I say this merely on human authority? Doesn’t the Law say the same thing? 9For it is written in the Law of Moses: “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain.” Is it about oxen that God is concerned? 10Surely he says this for us, doesn’t he? Yes, this was written for us, because whoever plows and threshes should be able to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest. 11If we have sown spiritual seed among you, is it too much if we reap a material harvest from you? 12If others have this right of support from you, shouldn’t we have it all the more?

But we did not use this right. On the contrary, we put up with anything rather than hinder the gospel of Christ.

13Don’t you know that those who serve in the temple get their food from the temple, and that those who serve at the altar share in what is offered on the altar? 14In the same way, the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel.

That is, Peter

Deut. 25:4

Although Paul calls this his “defense,” what comes next is not quite what one would ordinarily expect from such language. In a series of cascading questions the apostle plays variations on a single theme: his right to their material support. Since he will go on later (vv. 12b and 15–18) to explain why he has renounced this “right,” and since this touchy issue is addressed again—in a similarly defensive way—in our next letter (2 Cor 11:7–12; 12:13), it seems certain that the Corinthians have raised it. And since this occurs in the context of Paul’s defending his apostleship (vv. 1b–3), most likely his failure to accept support from them has been used against him to call his apostolic authenticity into question. Probably lying behind it all is the overwhelming issue of Corinthian “pride” that Paul has been dealing with throughout, beginning with 1:18–2:5. At the same time one might rightly wonder whether lying just below the surface is an attempt to offer himself as an example to the Corinthians as to how they might also view themselves and their own passion for “rights.”

But how could such a problem have arisen? Most likely it is related to some sociological factors—of a kind also lying behind the problem of division and quarreling to which he responded at the outset (1:10–4:21). Part of that problem was that they were viewing their various teachers in terms of contemporary popular philosophy. Apparently this involved not only the form and content of the teaching (see on 1:17 and 2:1–5), but also their teachers’ means of support. Philosophers and wandering missionaries in the Greco-Roman world made their living in one of four ways: fees, patronage, begging, and working. Each of these had both proponents and detractors, who viewed rival forms as not worthy of philosophy.

Various bits of evidence from the Pauline letters and Acts suggest that this is an issue with which Paul himself occasionally had to struggle, especially in the Greco-Roman cities where he would spend considerable time. The evidence suggests that by the time of his ministry in Thessalonica Paul had generally abandoned patronage (as, e.g., in Philippi in Lydia’s household, Acts 16:15) for working (in his case in the trade of tentmaking) as his basic means of support (1 Thess. 2:9; 2 Thess. 3:7–9; 1 Cor. 4:12; cf. Acts 18:3). Why he did this cannot be fully known, although his defense in his earliest letter (1 Thess. 2:1–12) has so many correspondences to the philosophical debates (esp. against those receiving fees, and perhaps patronage as well) that one wonders whether something happened in Thessalonica that made him realize his need to be more careful about his means of livelihood, lest the gospel itself come into disrepute. In any case, both Luke (Acts 18:3) and Paul (1 Cor. 4:12) bear witness to the fact that in Corinth, apparently by design as much as in need, he obtained his livelihood in Aquila’s workshop. His difficulty appears to have arisen when later teachers (Apollos and Cephas[?]) and perhaps some outside agitators, by their own acceptance of patronage, placed Paul’s renunciation of it into bold relief. Not only was his working demeaning to himself but to the Corinthians as well (2 Cor. 11:7). From their point of view his apostleship is thereby also called into question.

Understandably, Paul’s response to this is not first of all to defend his renunciation of his rights, but to establish that he has such rights. This must be done because apparently they have questioned his authority altogether. From their point of view his activity would not have been the renunciation of assumed rights; rather, he must have worked with his hands because he lacked such rights. Since, therefore, he did not do as the others—accept patronage—he must not be a genuine apostle. Thus Paul begins with a series of three rhetorical questions whose aim is the point of the third question (v. 6), that he has the right not to work for a living, and therefore to be supported by them. He then illustrates this with examples from everyday life (v. 7) and from the OT (vv. 8–10). After applying this to his own situation in Corinth (vv. 11–12a), he starts to explain why he has given up this right (v. 12b). But then he remembers two more pieces of supporting evidence for the previous argument, religious practice in general (v. 13) and the teaching of Jesus in particular (v. 14). The net result is a long, impassioned “defense” of his apostleship in which he contends that he does indeed have the rights to their financial support even if, while in Corinth, he had chosen to give them up.

3 Having set up the matter with the preceding rhetorical questions, Paul now states that what follows is “my defense to those who sit in judgment on me” (cf. 4:3–4). For the verb “sit in judgment,” see on two earlier passages (2:14–15 and 4:3). The implication in both the latter instance (4:3–4) and here is that the Corinthians are in process of “examining” or “investigating” him; the evidence of the present context makes it certain that the “examination” is related to his apostolic authority. Most likely much of our letter and Paul’s relationship to the church is here brought into focus. Any number of items—the “divisions” in chapters 1–4, the combative nature of so much of the letter, their rejection of his former letter, the continuing ill will that prompted later visits and letters—all make sense when seen in light of this introductory sentence.

4–6 Paul begins his defense with a series of rhetorical questions whose function in the argument is singular: to force them to recognize, as they should already know, that he has all the rights of an apostle. Less certain is what each of them, especially the first set (vv. 4 and 5), specifically refers to. Since the rest of the argument takes up the final point (v. 6), that he has the right not to work at a trade, most interpreters understand the earlier two questions as variations on the same theme. Indeed, if there were only the first and third questions, probably no one would ever have thought otherwise. The problem lies with the second question (v. 5), which does not seem to fit this scheme so well, hence suggesting to some that the first one may not either. The alternative is to see these first two as reflecting two other concerns over rights where perhaps he has also been known to deviate from the standard pattern of other apostles, so that together the questions defend his rights on matters of food, marriage, and support. Although this latter suggestion is attractive in a number of ways, a closer look at the three questions, plus the context as a whole, seems to favor the former view, or a modified version of it.

Question 1 (v. 4) asks, “Don’t we have the right to food and drink?” The key word in each of the questions is exousia (see on 8:9). But in distinction to its earlier usage, where the nuance of “freedom” predominates, here the emphasis is on “authority” or “rights.” This is the word that has caused most interpreters to consider the argument to be setting himself up as an example for the “gnostics” mentioned in 8:1 to follow. Just as they have the exousia to eat but should curtail it for the sake of the weak, so too Paul has the exousia to eat and drink but has given it up for the sake of others. The problem with that view is that nothing in the text itself suggests as much, not to mention the forceful nature of the insistence on “rights,” which seems to move the concern in a different direction.

But to what does “food and drink” refer? Coming so soon after the preceding, concluding sentence (8:13) as it does, it may be that exousia really does mean “freedom” and that the issue is his own freedom to eat certain food, even though he has given up this right. Thus it would anticipate the matter spoken to at the end (vv. 19–23). Attractive as that is in terms of the preceding context and the usage of exousia, it is nonetheless difficult to sustain here. The preceding issue was not merely eating idol food; it was eating it in the idol temples. And despite 8:13, other parts of this argument (9:19–23; 10:29b–30; and 10:31) indicate that Paul did not always abstain from such food sold in the marketplace—which he did in fact in the matter of support from the Corinthians. Furthermore, the combination “food and drink” seems to move it out of the arena of the former argument over food to that of sustenance. Most likely, therefore, this is the first in a series of three questions that argue for his right to their support.

Question 2 (v. 5) is the one that is full of puzzles: “Don’t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Cephas?” On the one hand, its noteworthy position between the questions regarding sustenance (v. 4) and working for a living (v. 6) implies that it at least has to do with his “rights” to their support; on the other hand, the very nature of the question, and especially the contrasts with so many others, implies that the issue here is more than just material support. Those who see this as a second issue over his apostolic rights suggest that all of this means “Don’t I have the right to be married?” and that it might thus be related to the issue of his singleness noted earlier (chap. 7). Again, that has a measure of attractiveness to it, but here such a view is even more difficult to sustain. If that were his intent, then it must be admitted that this is a most circuitous and obtuse way of putting what Paul is perfectly capable of saying directly (cf., e.g., 7:2). Very likely both issues merge here. That is, he is in fact dealing with his right to their support, but this issue is here joined to another where his (and his companions’) way of life is strictly a minority option. Even his fellow tentmakers are a married couple (Acts 18:3). How is it, the Corinthians wonder, given what all others appear to do, that he and his companions are not accompanied by wives? Does this also say something about the authenticity of his apostleship?

The comparisons are as intriguing as they are brief. As what Paul says later makes certain (15:7), for him the word “apostle” was not confined to the Twelve. It is therefore quite impossible to know who all would be included in “the rest of the apostles.” Equally intriguing is his setting forth “the Lord’s brothers” in this way. This refers to Mary’s other children, some of whom are mentioned by name in the Synoptic tradition (Mark 6:3; Matt. 13:55). This passage makes clear that, even though they had questions during his earthly ministry (Mark 3:31; John 7:3; but cf. 2:12), they eventually came to believe in Jesus as Lord and were among his earliest followers after the resurrection (cf. Acts 1:14). How widely they may have traveled and how well known they were in the churches remains a mystery.

That Paul should mention Cephas is less surprising, since some in the community are using his name as a rallying point. But does this text suggest that Peter had in fact visited Corinth accompanied by his wife? The possibility is enhanced by the twofold mention of Cephas in the opening argument (see esp. on 1:12 and 3:22) and by the fact that he is singled out from the other apostles. On the other hand, the fact that some are rallying around Peter’s name—and doing so in its Aramaic version (Cephas)—whether he had ever been there or not, undoubtedly caused Peter to be singled out. It is of some interest that Paul does this with both Peter and James much later in the letter (15:4–7), and no one argues seriously that either James or the other brothers of Jesus had ever been in Corinth. Whether Peter had been or not simply cannot be known.

The third question (v. 6) puts the present problem in clearer focus: “Or is it only I and Barnabas who [lit.] do not have the right not to work?” Although this finally comes out where the original NIV did, “who must work for a living,” that is not in fact what Paul says, and surely not what he intended. Rather, Paul is making the point that their “working with their hands [at a trade; cf. 4:12]” was not a matter of necessity, for sustenance as it were, but of reasoned choice. The implication is that the problem for the Corinthians is not simply that he took no support from them (i.e., that he refused to take patronage in the home of one of their wealthier members), but that he supported himself in the demeaning fashion of working at a trade. What kind of activity is this for one who would be an “apostle of our Lord Jesus Christ”? Paul’s point of course is that he did indeed have the right not to do so, even though for his own reasons—and thus reasons unknown to us—he rejected it while in Corinth.

The mention of Barnabas is especially intriguing. Why not Silas, for example, or Timothy? The answer almost surely does not lie with the suggestion that Barnabas had also visited Corinth, but with the probability that traditions about the apostles were well known throughout the network of early believers. And in this case Paul and Barnabas in particular apparently were known to have worked at a trade when they evangelized.

Thus even though the three questions all relate to the same issue, that of his right to their material support, each picks up a different aspect of that concern. Paul has the right (1) to have the Corinthians supply his daily needs; (2) to have a wife, who would also accompany him in his ministry; and (3) not to have to work at a trade in order to make ends meet. From here he will present several kinds of illustrations that further demonstrate this right.

7 With yet another set of rhetorical questions Paul proceeds to illustrate the point of the first set of questions (vv. 4–6). This set of three are all drawn from commonplace realities: the soldier, farmer, and shepherd. Each expects a negative answer. No soldier serves “at his own expense”; every vinedresser eats the grapes (cf. Deut. 20:6; Prov. 27:18); every shepherd “drinks the milk.” Even though as an analogy the first differs slightly from the other two, in each case the point is the same: In everyday life one expects to be sustained by one’s labors. So with the apostle. He should expect to be sustained from his “produce” or “flock”—the church that owes its existence to him.

8 Paul, however, is seldom content with an argument based solely on the “way things are,” so he supports his “rights” with an appeal to Scripture in the form of yet another, now dual set, of rhetorical questions. In this case the first question, which expects a negative answer, sets up the second, which expects an affirmative. The NIV captures these nuances by making them two separate questions. In asking “Do I say this on merely human authority?” Paul is referring first of all to the immediately preceding illustrations from everyday life, but beyond them also to the point of the preceding rhetoric, his right to their support (vv. 4–6). What is not as clear is the precise nuance of “from a merely human point of view” (cf. 3:3; 15:32). This may mean “Is my right to your support based simply on analogies from everyday life?” But the contrast with the Law in the next clause suggests that it means something more like “Are the analogies I have just given based on a merely human perspective?” “Of course not,” is the intended response, leading to the second clause, “Does not the Law say these things as well?” Paul does not usually appeal to the OT by this designation, and never so after the Judaizing controversy erupts. As the fuller formula that follows indicates (v. 9), “Law” here refers more precisely to the Pentateuch rather than to the OT in general, as it will later (14:21), where he cites Isaiah with this formula. What Christians call the Old Testament was considered the Word of God by the Jews of the NT era, so an appeal to its words is an appeal to the eternal God’s own authority.

9–10 With an explanatory “for” Paul proceeds to cite what “is written in the Law of Moses”: “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain” (Deut. 25:4). The citation itself offers no difficulty; it demonstrates by analogy from the words of Scripture what was argued from the earlier, everyday analogies (v. 7), that the laborer is permitted to enjoy the material benefits of the harvest. That point Paul himself makes by his application at the end (v. 10). The text reflects the ancient agricultural practice of driving an ox drawing a threshing-sledge over the grain to release the kernels from the stalk. Out of mercy for the laboring animal the Israelites were forbidden to muzzle the ox, so that it might have some “material benefit” from its labor. Paul now sees that as “written for us.”

But Paul’s explanation of the OT text has created problems for many. He begins with yet another rhetorical question, similar in form to the preceding one, where the first part expects a negative answer, while the second part expects a positive. The difficulties lie with the first part, where Paul seems to deny that the passage from the Law expressed any concern for the ox, and with the word translated “surely” in the second part, which can mean either “entirely” (NRSV) or something like “certainly, undoubtedly, by all means.” This in turn has led to considerable discussion—or bald assertions—about Paul’s use of the OT.

The difficulty is chiefly of our own making. There is little question that Paul expects a negative answer to the first part of his question, “Is it about oxen that God is concerned?” But that does not mean either that Paul is contradicting the meaning of the OT text, or that he is allegorizing, or that he is arguing from the “lesser to the greater.” To understand Paul’s use of Scripture here, three things need to be noted: (1) he is not trying to make a statement about the OT text per se. The first part of the question exists strictly to set up the second part: “or does it [the Law] undoubtedly [assuredly, by all means] speak for our benefit?” (2) In keeping with the entire ancient Near East, Paul well understood the paradigmatic, analogical character of law. By their very nature the laws, which are limited in number, do not intend to touch all circumstances; hence they regularly function as paradigms for application in all sorts of human circumstances. It should be noted at this point that Paul does not speak to what the law originally meant, which tends to be our concern. He is concerned with what it means, in terms of its application to their present situation. There is a sense in which he clearly keeps the original intent; he simply changes the application. (3) In addition Paul’s whole view of the OT was conditioned by his new eschatological existence in Christ. In saying that God is not (now) concerned for the oxen but for us, Paul reflects the same eschatological view of the OT expressed a bit later (10:11), that Scripture ultimately exists for those upon whom the end of the ages has come. That is not so much a denial of concern for animals as it is a recognition that even the Law’s concern for the oxen was a way of teaching Israel of God’s mercy toward all. And because “we” stand at the end of the ages, toward which and for whom all former things were pointing, Paul argues, “surely it says this for us, doesn’t it?”

Paul’s own concern is found in the elaboration of the second part of the rhetorical question: “Yes, this was written for us, because whoever plows or threshes should be able to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest”; that is, they should fully expect to share in the material benefits of their labors. Paul thus applies the analogy of the threshing ox to yet another analogy from farming, both of which together make the point that he has the right to their material support.

11–12a In “his best sermonic style” Paul now picks up the themes from the preceding analogy and applies them specifically to the present argument. He has “sown spiritual seed” among them; it should be “no big thing,” therefore, for him “to reap a material harvest” from them. If “others” have so benefited from the Corinthian believers, should not he have that right as well? At the same time, however, there is a subtle shift from the first person singular (“I”) to the first plural (“we”). Thus at this point he momentarily enlarges the overall landscape to include both himself and his co-workers, before returning to the first singular at the beginning of the next paragraph (v. 15). The language “spiritual” and “material” is the same as that in Rom. 15:27, where Paul speaks in a similarly reciprocal way of the coming of the gospel to the Gentiles as “spiritual blessings” and their collection for the poor in Jerusalem as “material blessings.” His work in Corinth had been that of “sowing” the gospel, which meant for them the “reaping” of the things that have to do with the Spirit. Is it too much that this should now work in reverse, that they should benefit him materially? This application, especially with the use of “is it too much” to begin the apodosis, makes it clear that Paul is contending with them, not simply setting himself forth as an example for them to follow. This becomes even more clear in the next sentence.

The final question (v. 12a) in this long rhetorical argument puts everything into focus. “Others” have been receiving the kind of patronage that Paul is arguing for as his own “right.” At this distance we cannot be sure who is intended by these “others.” Although it may refer to the “numberless guardians” mentioned earlier (4:15) or the “others” mentioned above (9:2), most likely it refers to Apollos and Peter. It seems likely that their accepting material benefits from the Corinthians is what has put Paul on the defensive. On this matter his own failure to accept patronage has made it appear as if he did not have the right to such. So now, on the basis of the preceding analogies, and especially the preceding application of the farming analogy (v. 11), he turns this around on them. If others (= “those reaping”?) have such rights, my having sown the gospel among you only means that “we [= I] have them all the more.”

The language of this sentence is especially telling. Literally Paul says, “If others share your authority, should not rather we?” The verb “share” echoes the harvest metaphor at the conclusion of the preceding rhetoric (v. 10); what “we” have a share in is exousia, “authority,” or in this context, “rights” (as in vv. 4–6). What is not clear is the nuance of the pronoun “your.” Although this may well be a subjective genitive (= “share in the rights you bestow”), it is more likely objective (= “share in rights over you,” i.e., “reap the benefits of the rights that are theirs by virtue of their ministry among you”). “Rights” is what the argument is all about, namely “rights” to material support, which are his by virtue of his apostleship. Thus, if others have actually had a share in those benefits, how much more do I have such rights, even if I have never made use of them.

12b With a series of “not/but” contrasts, Paul begins to explain why he “did not use this right (exousia)” as “others” had. The fuller explanation will be given next (vv. 15–18); but before he gets to that, he will offer yet two more illustrations of the fact of his rights (vv. 13–14).

The explanation here is that rather than “use this right, on the contrary, we put up with anything rather than hinder the gospel of Christ.” In saying this Paul indicates both that this was a conscious choice on his part and that it was something that brought a certain amount of hardship. As noted earlier, this began as early as the mission to Thessalonica, where he refers to laboring with his own hands as something he did “night and day” so as not to burden anyone (1 Thess. 2:9–10; 2 Thess. 3:8).

The reason for this choice is expressed in terms of not causing any hindrance to “the gospel of Christ,” which for Paul would mean not to obstruct evangelizing in any way. Paul is a man of a single passion, “the gospel of Christ.” As he will soon go on to explain (vv. 19–23), everything he is and does is “for the sake of the gospel.” When it becomes a choice, therefore, between his “rights” and others’ hearing of the gospel, there is no choice at all; anything that would get in the way of someone’s hearing the gospel for what it is, the good news of God’s redeeming grace, can be easily laid aside.

There has been considerable speculation over what Paul might have had in mind as to the “hindrance.” Although he does not specify here, the clue lies in the explanation that follows (vv. 15–18), which this sentence anticipates. By preaching the gospel “freely,” that is, without accepting “pay,” he is able further to illustrate the “free” nature of the gospel. Almost certainly this stands over against the itinerant philosophers and missionaries, who “peddled” their “wisdom” or religious instruction (cf. 2 Cor. 2:17; 1 Thess. 2:5–10). At the same time, since this protest is inserted here (vv. 13–14 make it clear that the argument is not yet finished), right after mentioning “others” who obviously did not follow this practice, Paul most likely intended this to be in contrast to them as well—all the more so if some of these “others” are the opponents mentioned in his next (preserved) letter to them (2 Cor. 11:20), although this is less than certain.

13 But the argument is not over. Either the preceding sentence is an intentional interruption, or else having begun to explain why he gave up those rights, Paul suddenly remembers that there are further illustrations that even more strongly support the argument. In either case, he proceeds to adduce two more reasons—the most telling yet—why he has rights to their support. Up to now the argument, even the one from Scripture, has proceeded on the basis of analogies—the soldier, vinedresser, shepherd, threshing ox, plowman/thresher, and sower/reaper. All of these labor in hope of receiving a share in the benefit of their labor. Before referring to a word from the Lord that speaks directly to this situation (v. 14), Paul has one more analogy, but this time from a very comparable situation—the various ministrants in the temples.

The argument begins with another “Do you not know that?” (cf. 3:16). In this case we can be sure that “they knew that.” Both in Jewish and pagan temples (so it matters little as to the background here), the priests who served in making the sacrifices shared in the sacrificial food itself. What makes this analogy pertinent, of course, is that the larger context of this argument is precisely this one, where “those who are employed in the sacred rites get their food from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in what is offered on the altar.” Thus with this analogy Paul is pressing the argument close to home.

14 Finally, on the basis of the preceding analogy (“in the same way”), Paul clinches the argument with a word from the Jesus tradition (cf. 7:10, 25): “The Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel.” Paul is here referring to the saying of Jesus that appears in Luke 10:7 (“the worker deserves his wages”; cf. Matt. 10:10), spoken originally in the context of his sending out the 72 (the 12 in Matthew’s gospel). But as Matthew’s context makes clear, it soon became a word in the church for the larger context of those who were to become the missionaries of the kingdom. Jesus’ word itself is not a “command” but a proverb, applied by Jesus to his telling the 72 that they are to eat and drink whatever is given to them. But for Paul such a word of Jesus may be described as a “command” because it has that net effect in the tradition. Whether or not it was previously known in Corinth cannot be known, although the casual way in which Paul introduces it may suggest as much. In any case, for Paul this brings the long argument for his “rights” to their support to its direct and convincing conclusion.

One may properly experience a strange ambivalence toward this text. On the one hand, it serves as one of the key passages that make it clear that those who give themselves to the “work of the ministry” are deserving of material support. The whole reason for the argument is to assert that his giving up of these rights does not mean that he is not entitled to them. In a day like ours such rights usually mean a salary and “benefits.” On the other hand, the reason Paul feels compelled to make this kind of defense is that he has given up these rights. Contemporary Protestant ministers seldom feel compelled so to argue! The key to everything must be for us what it was for Paul—“no hindrance to the gospel.” For every valid ministry in the church of Jesus Christ this must be the bottom line. All too often, one fears, the objective of this text is lost in concerns over “rights” that reflect bald professionalism rather than a concern for the gospel itself.

15But I have not used any of these rights. And I am not writing this in the hope that you will do such things for me, for I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of this boast. 16Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! 17If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward; if not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. 18What then is my reward? Just this: that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge, and so not make full use of any of my rights in preaching it.

One is somewhat taken aback that Paul, having so vigorously defended his “rights” to their support, now argues with similar vigor for his “right” to give it up. Yet the full context indicates that this indeed has been his aim right along. The argument itself is one of the more complex in Paul’s letters. His overall concern seems clear enough: to explain, in terms of his own unique relationship to the gospel, with its subtext of “no hindrance to the gospel” (v. 12), why he has deliberately not accepted their patronage. But the expression of that concern, both as to how this is his “boast” and how the final sentences (vv. 16–18) serve as grounds for that boast, is less clear; likewise the tension some feel between “the Lord’s command” (v. 14) and Paul’s apparent disregard of the “command” is also more apparent than real, since the “command” has to do with those who give, not with those who receive; for the recipient it would be a “right,” and “rights” may be freely given up.

After repeating (from v. 12b) that he not only has not used the rights just argued for so vigorously, but also that he is not now writing in order to secure them (v. 15ab), Paul begins the “explanation” with a surprisingly strong, but unfinished, insistence that he “would rather die than . . . ,” which is broken off by the equally strong assertion that “no one shall deprive me of my grounds for boasting” (v. 15c). What follows is a series of sentences that begin with “for,” each explaining or elaborating the former, but also seeming to take the argument astray somewhat. First, he explains what his boast does not consist of—preaching the gospel per se (v. 16a). This is followed by two sentences that explain why evangelizing cannot be his boast; he is under divine compulsion to proclaim the good news (v. 16). But with that he adds a new wrinkle: Since he is under “compulsion,” he cannot receive “pay,” for “pay” implies voluntary labor. His labor has been “involuntary” in the sense that divine destiny has prescribed his task—he is a “slave” entrusted with a charge (v. 17). What “pay,” then, can he expect? With what seems to be something of a wordplay he answers that his “pay” is found in presenting the gospel “without pay” (v. 18a). The final reason for all this echoes the beginning of the paragraph, but with a slight change in verbs, implying that the “use” of his right (exousia; v. 12b) in this case would be a “misuse” of his authority (exousia; v. 18b).

Although one has the feeling that the argument got away from him a bit, nonetheless the explanations given here (vv. 16–17) probably help as much as anything in his letters to understand what made Paul tick. Indeed, it would be unfortunate if in the convolutions of the argument one were to miss the fact that his renunciation of his “rights” to material support is attributable to his singular passion for the gospel. Everything is done so as not to hinder the gospel (v. 12b), so as not to misuse his authority in the gospel (v. 18). By presenting the gospel “free of charge” he is himself thereby “free from all people”; no one except Christ has a claim on him (v. 19). Although Paul himself does not press the point here, his presenting the gospel “free of charge” also serves as a lived-out paradigm of the gospel itself—the “free” gospel that leads to their freedom from Satan’s oppression is thus freely given.

In all of this one must not lose sight of the larger argument. The Corinthians are rejecting his prohibition against their going to the pagan temples, contesting his right to do so by his failure to accept patronage. He has the right to such patronage, he has argued, as even the Lord had commanded. His restraint with regard to that right is not to be understood as not having it, but as related to his own calling. That calling is so interwoven with the gospel itself that he can do nothing that might hinder it, including accepting patronage—and perhaps lying just below all of this are the unspoken implications regarding their own attitudes toward eating in the pagan temple precincts, for which they apparently have argued so vigorously (8:1–12).

15 Paul now returns to what he began to explain earlier (v. 12b) after the opening outburst. The preceding argument (vv. 3–12a, 13–14), despite its vigorous, confrontational nature, is not to be understood as an attempt to secure material support; rather, it is a “defense” of his rights to that support, a defense forced upon him by their denial of his apostolic “authority.” “But,” he now repeats, even though he has the authority, “I have not used any of these rights.” To make sure that this is clearly understood, he adds the further demurrer, “Furthermore, I am not writing this in the hope that you will do such things for me.” That is, he is not writing this defense so that they will now begin to do for him what they have been doing in the case of “others” (v. 12).

So strongly does Paul feel about his need to exercise restraint in this matter that his initial response to the idea that someone might think he is here trying to secure his rights is to remonstrate, (lit.) “For it is good for me rather to die than. . . .” But with that his sentence breaks off; and it is not certain how he might have intended to finish it—or whether he intended to at all, since the broken clause has power in its own right. He probably did not intend, as some have suggested, that it would be better to die from the kinds of hardships working for his own living imposed on him (cf. 4:11–13) than to accept material support from the Corinthians. Most likely the interrupting sentence is the direction he really wants the explanation to go.

As an apostle he has the “authority” to apostolic “rights.” But to have assumed those rights would have meant to put a hindrance in the way of his proclaiming the gospel (v. 12b). Thus he asserts, “no one shall nullify my boast!” But what can that mean, especially in a context in which he is explaining why he has given up his apostolic rights to support? The answer to this is not easy, since what follows is an explanation of what his boast is not, which is followed by a further explanation that no longer pursues the theme of “boasting” as such. Probably he is indeed referring to his not accepting patronage; but that is to be understood in light of the preceding sentence about not hindering the gospel, and one that follows (v. 18, “that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge”); it therefore should probably not be understood to be in contrast to “others” who accept patronage. That is, Paul is not “boasting” in what he does in contrast to what others have done, but in an indirect way in the gospel itself.

“Boasting” is a particularly Pauline word in the NT. Most often it is a pejorative term (cf. 1:29; 5:6). When Paul uses it positively, his “boast” (or “glory”) is ordinarily in things that stand in contradiction to human “boasting/glorying” (Christ crucified, weaknesses, sufferings; cf. 1:30–31; 2 Cor. 10–12; Gal. 6:14). The paradox of his boasting in his apostleship is related to this reality: God has called him and his churches into being; therefore, he may “boast/glory” in what God does, even through Paul’s own weaknesses. Almost certainly this present “boast” is to be understood in these terms. Thus his preaching the gospel without pay is both a calculated decision so as not to hinder the gospel and an expression of his form of apostolic “weakness.”

16 Both the “for” with which this sentence begins and its content suggest that Paul now intends to explain the final clause in the preceding sentence, “no one shall nullify my boast.” The explanation itself is given in negative terms—what his boast does not consist of. The content of the explanation, “preaching the gospel,” supports the interpretation that Paul’s “boast” has to do with the gospel, most likely in activity that does not hinder it. “No one shall nullify my boast,” he has asserted, that is, “preaching the gospel without taking ‘pay’ = without putting a hindrance in its way.” Now he must explain: “For if I preach the gospel, which I do all the time, that in itself is no grounds for boasting—at least not for me.” In the next two sentences Paul proceeds to explain how this is so.

First, he says, “I am under compulsion” (not “I am compelled to preach,” which sounds altogether too much like a Protestant minister with “preacher’s itch”). As Käsemann has pointed out, this is not to be understood psychologically, as some “inner compulsion” resulting from his call or from his sense of being “driven” because he was formerly a persecutor. The word “compulsion” here most likely refers to his divine destiny. To preach the gospel of Christ is not something he chose to do, which is quite the point of what he says next (v. 17); it is something he must do. God had ordained such a destiny for him from birth and had revealed it to him in the event of the Damascus road (Gal. 1:15–16). From that time on, proclaiming Christ to the Gentiles was both his calling and his compulsion. He “had to” do it because God had so taken hold of him (cf. Phil. 3:12). Indeed the compulsion is so great that “Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” Again, “woe is me” is not to be understood in terms of common parlance, as if he would experience some kind of inner distress if he were to fail to preach. Since this is his divinely appointed destiny, he thereby would stand under divine judgment if he were to fail to fulfill that destiny. His point is a simple one, which has nothing to do with “inner compulsion.” As in an earlier moment (4:1), Paul is reflecting once more on his “servanthood,” which for him meant “calling” and “joy,” not drudgery and head-hanging obedience. He cannot boast in the task of proclaiming the good news of Christ to the Gentiles because that is what he must do by divine design, an “obligation” he has gladly taken on as divine calling. Thus in Paul’s own self-understanding he is simultaneously Christ’s “slave” and Christ’s “freedman.”

17 What one expects next in this argument is an explanation of what Paul’s boast does consist of, since it does not consist of preaching the gospel as such. Instead we are given yet one more explanation, this time of what has just been asserted as to the “compulsory” nature of his task. With his own task clearly in view, he offers two alternatives about “working”—free person and slave—that prevail under ordinary circumstances. One might “perform this task voluntarily,” that is, as a free person; or “involuntarily,” that is, as a slave. If one is free and does it voluntarily, then one is entitled to “pay” or a “reward.” Despite some voices to the contrary who suggest that it reflects Paul’s real situation, this first sentence is intended merely to set up the opposite alternative, which in fact rules out any possibility of “reward” or “pay” in his case. The word translated “reward” is intended to be understood metaphorically as “pay.” Paul’s point is the one with which he began the preceding sentence (v. 16). He cannot boast in preaching the gospel because he does not do so of his own choosing. If he had done so by his own volition, then he is entitled to pay. But he has not done so, so what “pay” is there for him?

That much seems certain; but less clear is how one is to punctuate the second clause. Did Paul intend, “If not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. What then is my reward?” (NIV), or “If without choice of my own I have been entrusted with a charge, what then is my reward?” Although both come out at nearly the same point, grammatical considerations favor the former. His point is that if his labor is not voluntary, as the preceding sentence has made clear, then he is not entitled to pay. He makes that point by returning to a metaphor used much earlier (4:1). His apostleship is similar to that of a “steward” (usually a slave) who has been “entrusted with” managing a household. Such a person is entitled to no pay, which is exactly the point he will make in the next verse, and therefore is the reason for these two sentences.

18 Paul’s argument has now gone afield a bit, so with this question, which follows directly from what has immediately preceded, Paul begins to pull the loose threads together. “What then is my reward?” he asks of one who is entitled to no reward. Since his apostolic ministry is his by divine appointment, given to him quite apart from his own choosing, his “pay” in such circumstances is to do something that was not imposed on him, namely “that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge.” In one sense his “pay” is in fact to receive “no pay”! But in the present argument this nonpayment “payment” also gives him his apostolic “freedom” from all (people and circumstances), so that he might the more freely make himself a slave to everyone (v. 19). Thus in terms of his own ministry, his “pay” turns out to be his total freedom from all merely human impositions on his ministry.

At the same time, however, the way the argument is structured implies that his “pay” and his “boast” refer to the same reality, preaching the gospel without accepting support so as to put no hindrance before the gospel. Thus his “reward,” functioning also as his “boast,” is to be found in the “weakness” of working with his own hands so as not to hinder the forward progress of the gospel. In offering the “free” gospel “free of charge” his own ministry becomes a living paradigm of the gospel itself. That seems to be the point of the final result clause, translated in the NIV as “and so not make full use of my rights in the gospel.” But that rendering makes the argument unnecessarily tautologous and borders on meaninglessness. In fact Paul has here used the intensive form of the verb, which may mean “make full use of,” but which in this context most likely has the negative connotation of “abuse” or “misuse.” His point is that he offers the gospel “free of charge” so that he will not “misuse his authority (exousia) in the gospel” by “making use of his right (exousia) to live by the gospel” (vv. 12b and 14).

Thus in its own way this repeats Paul’s reason for not accepting the material support of his Corinthian friends expressed a few sentences earlier (v. 12b). He refuses to do anything that may hinder the gospel. He is an apostle, he has argued vigorously at the beginning (vv. 1–2); therefore he has the “authority/right” to their support, he has further argued in the (rather lengthy!) outburst of rhetorical questions that follow (vv. 4–14). But for the sake of the gospel he has not “used” that right (vv. 12b and 15). This is his boast and reward—to make the “free” gospel “free of charge.” And he does so, he concludes, so that he will not “misuse” what is rightfully his in the gospel.

The argument has thus come full circle. They have viewed his restraint in making use of his apostolic exousia to patronage as not having apostolic exousia at all. He does indeed have such exousia, he has argued, but for him use might be viewed as misuse. Thus he has refrained for the sake of the gospel. But this policy has also set him free from merely human restraints. He will now return to the theme of freedom (from v. 1) and explain how his nonuse of his rights enhances his freedom to be a servant of the gospel all the more.

Those who are quick to see the preceding rhetoric (vv. 4–14) as applicable to today’s ministry would probably do well to spend some time with this paragraph as well, and ask in terms of their own ministries how the “use” of their rights might at the same time become a “misuse”—of such a kind that the gospel itself is not so clearly heard in our day. It would not seem to require a lot of imagination to think of several such misuses, even in the most innocent of circumstances. Then the question really does become one of “rights” over against the gospel. The question is not whether one has the rights, but whether that is important. Those who see their calling as “necessity laid upon them” should also be glad to readjust their lives for the sake of the gospel.

19Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. 20To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. 21To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. 22To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. 23I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

Paul’s “defense” (v. 3) now broadens its scope considerably. After the extended rhetoric regarding his rights, and his right to lay them aside, he now sets out to explain his apparently chameleonlike stance in matters of social relationships. In so doing he returns to the opening question of the section, “Am I not free?” (v. 1). Just as with his not accepting patronage, so here he has done all things “for the sake of the gospel” (v. 23), meaning for the sake of sharing the good news with others.

The argument is not difficult and can be easily traced. The opening sentence (v. 19), which introduces the new themes, flows directly from the immediately preceding argument, as an essential part of it. Since as Christ’s slave (household manager) he cannot receive “pay” (vv. 17–18), he is thereby also “free” from all people (i.e., free from the restrictions that patronage might impose), so that he may “freely” become the “slave” of all. The outworking of this free slavery is then delineated under four categories (Jews, those under/without the law, the weak), for each of whom Paul has been willing to accommodate himself “in order to win” them (vv. 20–22a). Thus he became “all things to all people so that by all possible means he might save some” (v. 22b). A final sentence (v. 23) puts everything into perspective: He does “all this for the sake of the gospel,” that he “might share in its blessings.”

The difficulty lies with the contextual question: How does this paragraph function in the present argument as well as in the larger issue of “food sacrificed to idols”? Related to this is the difficulty of identifying the four groups that make up the heart of the paragraph (vv. 20–22). Because of the final item, “to the weak I became weak,” most scholars have seen the paragraph as returning to an earlier issue (8:13), where Paul is depicted as offering himself as an example of willing self-restraint for the sake of others. Others, noting the affinities with what has immediately preceded (vv. 15–18), have seen it as a concluding word on the matter of his not taking material support. That is, his real pay is his “freedom” to “gain” as many as possible for the sake of the gospel.

The solution to this question, however, would seem to lie elsewhere. The affinities with what has immediately preceded (vv. 15–18) seem clear and unmistakable; nonetheless, there are very few parallels in the actual content of the two paragraphs. In the former Paul deals with his giving up his right to their material support; now he defends his stance on questions of social relationships in various kinds of settings. Most likely, therefore, these affinities are related to what was said early on (v. 3): Paul is still defending his apostleship against those who are calling him into question. He has just brought the one issue, his not accepting patronage, to a conclusion—although what is said in this paragraph will help even more to put that into perspective. But now he is concerned with what they view as conduct too “wishy-washy” for an apostle, and especially for an apostle who would deny them the “right” to attend the cultic meals with their pagan friends. Indeed, Paul’s own conduct delineated here could well have been used against him. Paul thus takes the occasion of this defense to explain his conduct, an explanation that rests solely on the cause of evangelism, not his right to do as he pleases.

If this is the proper understanding of the literary context, then the question still remains, What specific conduct of Paul’s is here in view? Although one cannot be certain, the clear affinities in language and concern between this passage and the one that brings closure to the whole (10:23–33) suggest that the issue has to do in part at least with Paul’s stance toward marketplace food. Because on this matter he considered himself free, he ate or did not eat, depending on the situation. In either case, he refused to make an issue of it on its own, since he considered it a question of food only, not a matter of idolatry or principle. Given that this was such a “hot issue” elsewhere in the early church (Acts 15:29; Rev. 2:14, 20), one can well understand how Paul’s own relaxed attitude toward it could have brought him to grief from several quarters.

19 With these words Paul now returns to the opening question, “Am I not free?” But he does so by way of the immediately preceding argument, where he had used the analogy of a household manager (often a trusted slave) as the reason he could not receive “pay” (vv. 17–18). With an explanatory (or inferential) “for,” he now argues that, since he is thus “free and belongs to no one,” he has paradoxically used that freedom to become “a slave to everyone.” Because he is Christ’s slave, he must work without pay; but working without pay also makes him free from any merely human restraints on his ministry, so that he might freely become other people’s slave as well. In saying that he is “free from all,” therefore, Paul is not referring to inner freedom, nor to freedom from sin or the law. Rather, he primarily means “financially independent of all.” In this context that especially means that he is also “free” of those, such as the Corinthians, who would use such material support as a means of manipulating him and his ministry. Because he is Christ’s slave, he “belongs to no one,” meaning he is “owned” by no others and is thus ultimately accountable only to his own Lord (= Master).

On the other hand, “freedom” is not his goal; the salvation of others is. Thus, since he is financially independent of all people, he is able freely to put himself at the disposal of all for the sake of the gospel. His language for this servanthood, “I made myself a slave to everyone,” not only keeps the present metaphor intact but also is what he and his churches have learned to use about the ministry of Jesus, who became “slave” of all in order to save (cf. Phil. 2:5–8; Gal. 4:4–5). This is why Paul regularly uses the word “servant” (or “slave”) to speak of his own ministry (cf. 2 Cor. 4:5), and also why this becomes the basic expression of believers’ relationships to one another (e.g., Gal. 5:13): Jesus himself is the paradigm for such servanthood. Free, in order to become slave/servant to all—this is surely the ultimate expression of truly Christian, because it is truly Christlike, behavior.

In this context his becoming slave of all is to be understood in light of the examples that follow, thus referring to his willingness to accommodate himself to whatever social setting he found himself in, so as “to win as many as possible.” Such language, as the later interchange with “save” (v. 22b) makes clear, can only refer to evangelizing. Thus Paul’s first concern in such matters is not whether he offends or does not offend—although that too is a concern (10:32)—but whether the gospel itself will get its proper hearing (cf. 10:33).

20 Paul now proceeds to delineate what “making himself a slave to all in order to win as many as possible” means, by specifying some of the kinds of social settings in which he practiced evangelism. Although the package seems carefully constructed, its special features suggest that it is an ad hoc piece of rhetoric designed to defend his own past actions. Even though one cannot be certain about the specifics in some cases (“those under the law” and “the weak”), there can be little question that he is reflecting on his differing conduct in Jewish and Gentile settings, the central issue being questions of Jewish law. To put it in more contemporary terms, when he was among Jews he was kosher; when he was among Gentiles he was nonkosher—precisely because, as with circumcision, neither mattered to God (cf. 7:19; 8:8). But such conduct tends to matter a great deal to the religious—on either side!—so that inconsistency in such matters is viewed as especially perverse.

Paul’s policy quite transcended petty consistency—and “religion” itself. His concern was “to win the Jews,” as well as all others; thus “to the Jews I became like a Jew.” This opening item serves as the clue for understanding the others. How can a Jew determine to “become like a Jew”? The obvious answer is, In matters that have to do with Jewish religious peculiarities, which Paul as a disciple of the Risen One had long ago given up as having any bearing on one’s relationship with God. These would include circumcision (7:19; Gal. 6:15), food laws (8:8; Gal. 2:10–13; Rom. 14:17; Col. 2:16), and special observances (Col. 2:16). On these questions not only was Paul himself free; he also took a thoroughly polemical stance toward any who would impose such requirements on Gentile converts. On the other hand, he had no problem with Jewish converts continuing such practices, as long as they were not considered to give people right standing, or special advantages, with God. Nor did he exhibit unwillingness to yield to Jewish customs for the sake of the Jews (cf. Acts 16:1–3; 21:23–26). Although one cannot be certain, from the general context as well as the clear parallels with what will come later (10:23–33) one may infer that food laws are the specific issue here, especially the prohibition against eating marketplace food because of its associations with idolatry. Paul himself felt free to eat such food, as his concluding word (10:23–30) makes certain. The present text suggests that he also willingly refrained when he was in more strictly Jewish settings. It is probably this conduct, more than any other, to which his Corinthian opponents took exception.

The second item (“to those under the law”) is more puzzling. Ordinarily this would simply refer to Jews; but does it also do so when listed as a second item following “the Jews”? Most likely it does, and is so expressed because the specific issue was related not simply to matters of national origin but especially to matters of Jewish (religious) legal requirements. Particularly significant is the parenthetical addition, “though I myself am not under the law.” By these words Paul intends to clarify his own conduct as a matter of freedom—he “freely” made himself a “slave” for the sake of others—not of obligation. The difference, therefore, between his own behavior and that of his social companions is not in the behavior itself, which will be identical to the observer, but in the reasons for it. The latter abstain because they are “under the law”; it is a matter of religious obligation. Paul abstains because he loves those under the law and wants to win them to Christ. Despite appearances, in reality the differences are as night and day.

21 The third item in the series, “those not having the law,” corresponds to the second as its opposite. Paul is here referring to his conduct among Gentiles, including the majority of the Corinthian believers, and especially those who stand against him within the community. This item, plus the coming conclusion (v. 22b, “all things to all people”), seems to rule out the idea that Paul in this paragraph is offering himself as an example of self-restraint, since among these people he undoubtedly “ate whatever was put before him without raising any questions of conscience” (10:27). Their knowledge of his conduct in their presence, and of his abstinence when among “those under the law,” offers the best solution to the historical occasion of this paragraph.

The qualification in this instance is full of interest. As in the previous clause, he begins, “I became as one without the law, though I myself am not without the law.” But he can scarcely resist a play on words. Among Gentiles he behaves as one who is anomos (not under Jewish law), but he is not thereby to be considered anomos (“lawless” = “godless, wicked”; cf. 1 Tim. 1:9), which point is made by adding the qualifier “toward God.” Indeed, he goes on, I am ennomos (lit. “in law” = subject to law) toward Christ. His point is plain: He wishes no misunderstanding of the word anomos, which would ordinarily mean to behave in a godless way. To be “as one without the law” does not mean to be “lawless.” As earlier (7:19) this is a clear instance in which Paul can distinguish between keeping “the law” and obeying the ethical imperatives of the Christian faith. For Paul the language “being under (or ‘keeping’) the law” has to do with being Jewish in a national-cultural-religious sense; but as a new man in Christ he also expects the Spirit to empower him (as well as all of God’s new people) to live out the ethics of the new age, which are the “commands of God” (7:19) now written on hearts of flesh (cf. Ezek. 36:26–27).

In this instance the Christian ethical imperative is characterized in a most unusual way of speaking (for Paul, at least), as being “under Christ’s law.” Paul uses the word “law,” of course, because of the wordplay involving “law” compounds. This does not mean that in Christ a new set of laws has taken the place of the old, although in terms of specifics it would certainly refer to those kinds of ethical demands given, for example, in Rom. 12 and Gal. 5–6, so many of which do reflect the teaching of Jesus. Given the frequency of “lawlessness” among the Corinthians who opposed him, it is not difficult to understand the reason for this significant qualification!

22 Since the three preceding items have to do with Jewish or Gentile social settings, what then does Paul intend by this final item, “to the weak I became weak”? On the one hand, this is probably Paul’s way of beginning to bring the argument back around to where he left it (at 8:13–9:1). This seems all the more likely, since it follows hard on the heels of the discussion of the previous group, who almost certainly represent those with whom Paul is in conflict in this church and with whom he has been arguing throughout the letter. At the same time, however, especially since he speaks also of “winning them,” one must be careful of too specific an identification with the “weak” mentioned earlier (8:7–13). Perhaps the missing comparative (“like”) is more significant than is often allowed. This may well reflect a moment of realism and thereby intentionally be a more generalizing category. For any number of reasons, partly related to his working with his own hands, Paul experienced considerable weakness in Corinth (see on 2:1–5; 4:9–13; cf. 2 Cor. 4:7–18; 11:16–12:10). As noted regarding an earlier passage (4:9–13), he considered this to be a paradigm of the Christian life; thus “to the weak,” that is, the majority of the Corinthian believers (cf. 1:26–31), he “became weak, to win the weak.” Thus this language probably represents a more purely sociological category than a socio-religious one. And the comparable contrast (“strong to the strong”) not only would not fit the present argument, but would finally border on nonsense. At this point Paul is a conscious follower of the humble carpenter from Nazareth, who had “nowhere to lay his head.”

However one is able to “fine tune” what has preceded, Paul’s concluding sentence, “I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some,” summarizes and thereby generalizes the argument. The apostle’s actions, which appear to them to be inconsistent, have integrity at a much higher level. Whereas he is intransigent on matters that affect the gospel itself, whether theological or behavioral (e.g., 1:18–25; 5:1–5, etc.), that same concern for the saving power of the gospel is what causes him to become all things to all people in matters that don’t count. The substitution of the verb “save” in this final clause makes it certain that the verb “win” in the five earlier clauses meant precisely that—eschatological salvation for the perishing through Christ’s death and resurrection (cf. 1:18, 21). For Paul everything is subordinated to this central concern of his life, this “destiny” that God has laid upon him (v. 16).

23 The argument concludes with a final, clear affirmation of the singular passion of his life: “All things for the sake of the gospel” (cf. vv. 12b, 15–18). The preceding argument makes it clear that by “the gospel” Paul is not referring to its content as such, but to the proclaimed gospel as God’s saving power at work in the world (cf. Rom. 1:16). Thus he means “for the sake of the progress of the gospel.” But the final purpose clause, (lit.) “that I may be a fellow-participant in it,” is less than certain. Is he referring to his participation in the work of the gospel, as in the preceding argument (esp. vv. 16–18), or to his sharing with them in its benefits (“blessings, promises”), in anticipation of the paragraph that follows? Although the former is an attractive option, Paul’s usage elsewhere suggests that he means the latter. The problem, of course, is that this sounds self-serving and seems to undercut what has been said in the preceding verses. But not so. Paul is not so much suggesting that he does all things so that in the end he will receive the benefits of the gospel, as that he places himself alongside those to whom he has preached and to whom he now writes. Along with them, he hopes to share in the final blessings of the gospel.

But such is not guaranteed; he and they must persevere in the gospel to share in its promises. Despite his final confidence in the sovereign work of God’s prior grace, he has genuine concern for the Corinthians, whose attendance at the cultic meals in the pagan temples is putting them in real jeopardy. And no false security in the sacraments (10:1–4) will help. Hence this concluding note on his own desire to share in the final blessings of the gospel leads him directly to an exhortation that they, too, as he, “run in such a way as to get the prize” (v. 24b), so that they will not be “disqualified” (v. 27).

This passage has often been looked to for the idea of “accommodation” in evangelism, that is, of adapting the message to the language and perspective of the recipients. Unfortunately, despite the need for that discussion to be carried on, this passage does not speak directly to it. This has to do with how one lives or behaves among those whom one wishes to evangelize (not, it needs to be added in passing, with social taboos among Christians). What needs to be emphasized is the point expressed clearly by Bornkamm: “Paul could not modify the gospel itself according to the particular characteristics of his hearers. The whole of his concern is to make clear that the changeless gospel, . . . empowers him to be free to change his stance.” This especially needs to be heard among those who would equate certain nonethical behavioral items with the gospel itself.

The greater difficulty for all who would so preach Christ is our inherent resistance, due to the fall, to the imitation of Christ expressed at the beginning (v. 19), that freedom leads to making oneself the servant of all in order to win them. Unfortunately, freedom too often is abused in the direction of self-interest rather than expressed in terms of concern for others and for the progress of the gospel.

24Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 25Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. 26Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. 27No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.

This paragraph is transitional; it brings the preceding long excursus to its conclusion and at the same time prepares for a return (in 10:1–22) to the argument begun in the preceding chapter against participation in the cultic meals. The entire passage consists of metaphors from the games. The use of athletic metaphors such as these had a long history in the Greek philosophic tradition, to which Paul is most likely indebted. Nonetheless, the usage and application are his own (perhaps based on his own personal observations of the athletes).

Paul begins with a general observation from the games, with running as the specific example: all run, but only one obtains the prize (v. 24a). He immediately applies that to the Corinthians, urging them so to run (v. 24b). Then he generalizes about the competitors and their prize (v. 25). About the competitors: they exercise self-control in all things so that they may obtain the prize; about the prize: the competitors in the games do so for a perishable wreath, “a ‘crown’ that will not last,” believers for the imperishable one. Next Paul applies the metaphors to himself (vv. 26–27). Using running and boxing, he insists that he does not “compete” aimlessly but with the goal in mind, thus reflecting the emphasis on the prize. Then, picking up on the boxing metaphor, he redirects it to the emphasis on self-control (discipline), that he not come short of the prize (although the metaphor switches to the idea of being disqualified from the contest).

The primary point of the metaphors is the imperative following the first queston (v. 24b), which controls the entire paragraph. Paul is urging the Corinthians to “run” the Christian life in such a way, in this case by exercising proper self-control (the emphasis in vv. 25–27), as to obtain the eschatological reward. In context, the area where they lack “self-control” is that of insisting on the right to continue eating in the environs of the pagan temples. Exhortation, therefore, is Paul’s primary purpose; but the passage also serves as a clear warning if they fail to “run” properly. As warning it anticipates what comes next (10:1–22). Inherent in the metaphor is the greater reality that entry into the contest itself does not guarantee the prize; Christian life requires perseverance as well.

At the same time this paragraph conveniently serves as a conclusion to the present excursus. Paul’s activities in curtailing his rights, yet exercising his freedom for the singular aim of “all things for the sake of the gospel,” are his own brand of exercising self-control in all things, which now surely is intended to serve as a paradigm for them, thus bringing him back to the point of departure (8:13).

24 The final “Do you not know that?” in this letter (see on 3:16) signals a continuation of the preceding argument, in this case by offering an illustration that will bring into focus the present concerns, going back to the final paragraph in the preceding chapter (8:7–13). The imagery is taken from the runners in the games, all of whom in any given race compete for the one prize. Although Paul will go on to elaborate on the theme of the “prize” (v. 25), that is a “complementary” image, not the primary concern. But neither is Paul’s point to be found in the imagery of this verse on its own, as though putting forth great effort were the concern; and especially his point does not lie with the fact that only one receives the prize, as though the Christian life were a competition of some sort. All such “meanings” may legitimately be judged as quite foreign to Paul, whose intent is found in the way he himself now proceeds to elaborate the imagery—the necessity of self-control in order to win the prize.

Paul’s concern is singular: “Run in such a way as to get the prize.” This exhortation is the point of the entire paragraph. It first of all picks up the theme of the preceding imagery, of the runner who is intent on winning the prize. Thus he means: “Run as one runs who is intent on winning the prize.” At the same time it points forward to the succeeding imagery, which explains both what one must do in order to win the prize and what constitutes the actual prize itself for which they are “running.”

25 Paul now displays his concern for the Corinthians by a further elaboration of the imagery. He makes two points: (1) the necessity of “self-control” in order to win the prize; and (2) the nature of the prize. The concerns, of course, are interrelated. Paul is genuinely concerned that they achieve the goal (cf. 6:9–11); what might cause their “disqualification” in this case is their insistence on the right to participate in the cultic meals at the pagan temples. Therefore, “everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training,” that is (lit.), “exercises self-control in all things.” Winning requires discipline, even for the best of athletes. Any athlete entered in the games was required to go into ten months of strict training and was subject to disqualification if he failed to do so. Paul now applies that figure to the Corinthians’—and his—situation. In their case it will mean not simply forgoing some rights for the sake of others (as in 8:7–13), but also forgoing some things altogether because they are inherently incompatible with the Christian “contest” (10:14–22).

To press this latter point Paul contrasts the forms of the prize. The athlete goes through such discipline to receive the victor’s “crown,” a “perishable wreath.” In contrast to that, Paul tells the Corinthians, “we get a crown that will last forever.” In this metaphor the Christian’s “crown” is not some specific aspect of the goal but the eschatological victory itself. As with other passages in this letter (e.g., 1:8; 4:5, 8; 6:2, 9; 15:12–19), this may incidentally emphasize the futurity of the Eschaton over against their “overrealized eschatology.” In any case, the figure is intended to impress upon them that the goal, being eternal in nature, is of such value that it should affect the way they live in the present.

26 With an inferential “therefore” and an emphatic “I,” Paul now elaborates on the preceding metaphors by applying them to his own life. “I therefore so run”—as you also are to run being implied. In part at least he probably intends this application to bring to a conclusion the defense that began a good while back (v. 3), and especially as expressed in the two preceding paragraphs (vv. 15–18 and 19–23). He wants the Corinthians to understand his own conduct in light of the foregoing metaphors, as they are now about to be elaborated. At the same time, however, the imperative with which he began (v. 24b), for which this is a further illustration, plus the explanatory “for” that follows (10:1), indicate that Paul also intends this application to be exemplary. Thus he is returning to the argument he momentarily let go of some time back (8:13), at which point, with a shift to the first person singular, he had set himself forth as an example that they should follow (cf. 11:1).

The two metaphors, from running and boxing, are so clearly parallel that both are no doubt intended to make the same point. He runs, he says, as the runner who is set on winning the prize (v. 24). However he now puts it negatively, “not like a man running aimlessly.” This can only mean “as one who has no fixed goal.” People who enter races, of course, do not do such things. Hence the absurdity of the metaphor makes its own point. Paul’s actions, which are defended in the preceding paragraphs, are not those of an aimless runner. Everything is focused—it is for the sake of the gospel, that he too might share in its blessings.

Likewise with the boxer; if he is to win the prize he does not “fight like a boxer beating the air.” But is this a picture of a boxer who fails to land telling blows while engaged in the contest, or of the exercise of shadow-boxing prior to the fight? The one speaks to the effectiveness of his effort, the other its purposefulness. Purposefulness seems to be more in keeping with the parallel in the first sentence. But the former picture could also be interpreted in that sense; that is, to get in the ring with an opponent and only beat air is as useless—and absurd—as the runner who has no eye for the finish line. This seems to make more sense, since shadow-boxing could be seen as a purposeful activity (i.e., part of the training for the fight), even though one can no longer do so in the contest itself. In either case, Paul’s point is that given in the preceding eschatological moment (v. 25). They are to understand his actions as those of one who has a clear vision of his goal; implied is his exercising self-control as part of that purposefulness. That is the point he will press in the final application of the metaphor that comes next.

27 In contrast to the absurd boxer, who would merely flail the air and not hit his opponent, Paul “boxes” with real purpose. He aims to win the prize of an imperishable crown. To do so, he argued (v. 25), the athlete exercises self-control. Now he applies that point in a more telling way by elaborating on the boxing imagery just mentioned. As the final clause makes clear, his concern about obtaining the prize is still in view—for himself obviously, but especially for them, as what follows (10:1–22) makes certain.

The metaphor itself gets considerably mixed because Paul is doing two things simultaneously: (1) picking up the theme of boxing from the immediately preceding clause, and (2) going back to the concern about self-control (v. 25). Thus like those of a purposeful boxer, his blows give “bruises.” But as is often the case for the apostle, his metaphors are fluid (see, e.g., on 5:6–8). Since his present concern is self-control, the object of the blows becomes “my body,” and since one metaphor calls for another, he leaves athletics altogether and adds, “and make it my slave,” that is, make it serve my purposes in the gospel. But he hardly intends them to understand his physical body as such as the “opponent” he must subdue in order to gain the prize. He uses “body” because of the metaphor; what he almost certainly intends by it is “myself,” as before (v. 19), which would include the body, but only as it is the vehicle of his present earthly life. His point, after all, is the need for self-restraint, not asceticism (which he thoroughly rejects) or self-flagellation. In his own case, such “bruising of the body” probably refers to the kinds of hardships to which he voluntarily subjected himself in preaching to the Corinthians, which included working with his own hands, and which in turn meant suffering the privations expressed earlier (4:11–13). In this way he “disciplined” himself “for the sake of the gospel,” so that he, along with them, might share in the promises of the gospel.

That this is Paul’s intent seems to be made certain by the final purpose clause, “so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.” Some have seen the reference to “preaching” as continuing the metaphor; but that seems unlikely, since this is Paul’s regular word for preaching, and the context (vv. 14, 16, 18, 23) indicates that it is to be understood literally, not metaphorically. With this language Paul is bringing the concerns of the foregoing defense back into focus. He exercises self-control in all things, he is telling them with the preceding metaphor, so that after he has fulfilled his task, laid on him by divine necessity (v. 16), he himself will not come short of the prize. To make that point he picks up the athletic metaphor one final time, “lest I be disqualified,” to which the NIV has (correctly) added “for the prize.” This has been the point of the metaphors from the beginning, that the Corinthians exercise self-control lest they fail to obtain the eschatological prize. As he often does, and especially so in the present context, he uses himself as the example of his concern. That he intends it as a word for them is made clear by the argument that follows.

But does Paul actually mean that one can fail to obtain the prize? Some would say no, but usually because of a prior theological commitment, not because of what the text itself says. While it is true that at the end of the next turn in the argument (10:13), after the severe warnings that have preceded (vv. 1–12), he once again puts his confidence in God to “keep them,” it would be sheer folly to suggest thereby that the warnings are not real. Paul keeps warning and assurance in tension. Simultaneously he exhorts and, by this and the following examples, warns the Corinthians of their imminent danger if they do not exercise “self-control” in the matter of idolatry; yet, as always (cf. on 5:8 and 6:11), he reminds them of their security in the prior activity of God, who has committed himself to them in Christ Jesus. In so doing—and again as always—he puts his final emphasis on God’s activity in our behalf.

It is unfortunate when such a powerful text, with its exhortation to discipline as a necessary part of the Christian life—and consequent warning if one take such exhortation lightly—gets sidetracked either in the allegorizing of details or in the kind of bodily discipline exercised in self-imposed asceticism. That is not to say that in an overindulgent culture some of us do not need to discipline our bodily appetites. But it is to say that we have been called to a higher life of service that includes self-control and the willingness to endure hardship as concomitants. Perhaps too many contemporary Christians have lost sight of their eschatological goal and are running aimlessly, if they are in the “contest” at all.

With the help of the preceding exhortation—and implicit warning—Paul has concluded his apostolic defense and returns to the matter at hand, the insistence by some of their number of the right to attend the cultic meals in the pagan temples. Earlier (8:7–13) he had argued from the perspective of the weak, who were being abused by this falsely “constructive” action (8:10). Now he speaks directly to those who are opposing him on this matter, first by severely warning them on the basis of OT examples of the grave danger they are in (vv. 1–13), and second by expressly prohibiting temple attendance as totally incompatible with the Christian life (vv. 14–22). As the first example (v. 7) explicitly indicates, and the second one (v. 8) implicitly, the content of the biblical exposition itself (vv. 1–13) is directed specifically at the problem of idolatry, especially in the form of eating at the pagan temples in the presence of a “god” that is no god at all. Since this is also the content of the prohibition that follows (vv. 14–22), there can be little question that the two sections are integral to one another; together they both warn against and prohibit attendance at cultic meals because such meals are expressions of idolatry.

1For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. 2They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. 3They all ate the same spiritual food 4and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. 5Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.

In the immediately preceding argument Paul has urged the Corinthians to run (the Christian life is implied) as those intent on obtaining the eschatological prize; the preceding application of the imagery to himself (vv. 26–27) serves as a warning that those who fail to exercise “self-control” may also “fail” of the prize itself. In the present section (10:1–13) that warning is now vigorously pursued. In ways reminiscent of similar moments in the OT, where in each case in Israel’s history their rejection of God’s mercies serves as warning (or reason for confession of sin) to a present generation, Paul here warns the Corinthians of the dire consequences of persisting in their present idolatry.

The argument comes in two parts. Paul begins (vv. 1–5) by setting forth Israel (“our fathers”) as Exhibit A of those who failed to obtain the prize. The power of the type lies in the fact that they also had their own form of “baptism” and “Lord’s Supper,” the prefigurement of ours. All of them had these privileges; nonetheless, God was displeased with most of them and “their bodies were scattered” all over the desert. This is followed (vv. 6–13) with a direct application to the Corinthians: first by offering four illustrations from the exodus as to why at various times some of them were overthrown (vv. 7–10), headed significantly by two examples of idolatry that included table fellowship with the idols; second by using these examples expressly to warn those Corinthians who thought that somehow they were above “falling.” At the end (v. 13) he offers a final word to believers who experience true “testing,” who thereby stand in sharp contrast to those who dare to “test” God.

The nature of this argument strongly suggests that those who “think they stand” (v. 12) do so on the basis of a somewhat magical view of the two primary participatory activities common to all who belong to Christ—one by way of initiation (baptism) and the other as an ongoing meal that he will eventually call “the Lord’s Supper” (11:20; in a later time together designated as “sacraments”). Otherwise one can scarcely make sense of the present paragraph. Therefore, their argument with Paul most likely included some reference to their own security through these “sacraments.” These so identified them as Christ’s people that attendance at the idol temples was immaterial, since those “gods” do not have real existence (8:4–6)—a perhaps understandable, but thoroughly misguided view of idolatry, which Paul will eventually put plainly to them at the end: that idols are not “gods” but rather are the habitation of demons.

1–2 An explanatory “for” and the vocative “brothers and sisters” indicate that the present argument has close ties with the exhortation and warning that have just preceded; at the same time it probably also indicates a shift from the preceding examples of Paul’s own use of freedom (9:1–23) in the context of self-discipline (vv. 24–27) to a discussion based on what Paul perceives as comparable historical examples of God’s people in their earlier deliverance (= “salvation”) from Egypt. Whatever else, the Corinthians are to run as those intent on winning; that is, they must exercise self-control in all things lest they end up being disqualified. “For,” he now goes on to explain, Scripture itself gives some primary examples of people who did not exercise “self-control” in the matter of idolatry and thereby failed to gain the prize.

The argument begins, “I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact that . . .” (cf. 12:1). One cannot tell what Paul intends by this formula, whether it is to give new information or a new slant on something previously known. The nature of the following argument suggests that the Corinthian believers were well aware of the data of the OT text; Paul wants to make sure they do not miss its significance for their lives.

What follows is one of the apostle’s more intriguing uses of the OT. In what appears to be a mixture of type and analogy (see on v. 6), he relates Israel’s crossing of the Red Sea and their being sustained by manna and water from the rock in terms of Christian baptism and the eucharistic meal, but concludes that the majority of them fell under God’s judgment in the desert. His point seems to be: Israel genuinely prefigures us when it comes to our experience of “baptism” and “Lord’s Supper”; be sure, therefore, that they do not prefigure us also in their idolatry (which unfortunately seems to be happening in the case of the Corinthians) and subsequent judgment.

By calling Israel “our ancestors,” Paul emphasizes at the outset the Corinthians’ continuity with what God had done in the past. Since he is writing to a Gentile congregation, this language is sure evidence of the church’s familiarity with the OT as their book in a very special sense, and of Paul’s understanding of their eschatological existence in Christ (cf. v. 11) as being in true continuity with the past. God’s new people are thus God’s true Israel, who fulfill the promises made to their fathers. This identification is precisely what gives such potency to the warning that follows.

Thus he begins: “All were under the cloud and they all passed through the sea” (see Exod. 14:19–22), which he then interprets as their being “baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.” The point seems to be: Just as the Corinthian believers’ Christian life began with baptism, so “our fathers’ ” deliverance from Egypt began with a kind of “baptism”; but that, Paul will go on to say, did not keep them from being seduced by idolatry and thus falling short of the prize. The language “baptized into Moses” is drawn not from the OT but from Christian baptism, where believers were baptized “into Christ” (Gal. 3:27; Rom. 6:3). Therefore, it should not be pressed, as though Paul were trying to say something either about Israel’s relationship to Moses or about Moses as a prefigurement of Christ—although the latter is a distinct possibility. This is analogy, pure and simple; as Moses was Israel’s earthly deliverer, so Christ is theirs. Since no further analogy is drawn by Paul himself, one should therefore assume that none is intended. Nor does Paul press any further aspects of the two “baptisms”; what is inherent to the typology is that both stand at the beginning of the two existences and that both are with water.

More difficult, therefore, is the reference to the cloud. In the narrative Paul describes them as being “under the cloud” and passing “through the sea.” In the interpretation (v. 2) the two are joined: They were all baptized into Moses “in the cloud and in the sea,” the cloud above and the wall of sea on either side together constituting their “baptism.” In the Red Sea account the cloud was the means through which Yahweh himself “went before them” to lead them (Exod. 13:21) and then moved behind them to separate them from the Egyptians (14:19–20). Is this then a veiled reference to the presence of God in Israel’s midst, comparable to the Spirit for Christians? Perhaps; but just as likely, if not more so, the two images had become so interwoven as a way of speaking of the deliverance event that Paul himself did not “mean” anything by it at all.

3–4a In a similar way Paul goes on to describe Israel’s experience of the miraculous bread (Exod. 16:4–30) and miraculous drinking of water from the rock (Exod. 17:1–7; Num. 20:2–13) as a form of “spiritual eating,” unquestionably viewing it as a type/analogy of the Lord’s Supper: “They all ate the same ‘spiritual’ food and drank the same ‘spiritual’ drink.” But what does he mean by calling their food and drink “spiritual”? That question is perhaps best answered by asking what other word he might have used to accomplish two ends simultaneously: (1) to refer to that food and drink which for Israel were supernaturally given and thus divinely sustained them in the desert; and (2) at the same time to suggest the analogy or type of the Lord’s Supper, the special food and drink of Christians. In any case, that is his concern and the reason for this choice of words; whether he intended something more than that is moot. The usage in the next sentence suggests that it points to a “spiritual reality” beyond that which meets the eye. But it is doubtful whether he was trying to say something about the sacramental character of the food, or that in some way it conveyed the Spirit; all such readings reflect concerns of later times and thus deflect the apostle’s own concerns regarding the Corinthian believers.

4b Paul reinforces the fact of their having received “spiritual food and drink” by interpreting the Israelite experience of water from the rock christologically. In so doing he most likely intends both to indicate how culpable Israel really was (they ultimately rejected Christ himself in their headlong plunge after idols) and to tie these prefiguring events even more closely to the Corinthians’ own situation (they, too, are testing Christ; vv. 9, 22). That much at least seems to be a reasonable understanding of Paul’s intent on the basis of the context. But understanding how he got there is another matter. There are two problems: the statement about the rock accompanying them and the identification of this rock with Christ.

First, he says that “they ‘used to drink’ from the spiritual rock that accompanied them.” Referring to the “rock” as also “spiritual” and then identifying it with Christ seems further to support what was suggested above as to the meaning of this word. But to what is Paul referring? It is common to see this as a reference to a popular rabbinic interpretation of the narrative in Numbers (21:16–18), to the effect that the well (known as Miriam’s well and shaped like a rock) accompanied Israel in the desert, serving as a continuous, miraculous source of water. Although several legendary features attached themselves to this tradition as time went on, there can be little question that in its basic form it goes back at least to the time of Paul. From this point in time it is difficult to assess the relationship of Paul’s statement with this tradition, especially since he refers only to the “rock” and the rabbinic traditions gathered around the “well” from Num. 21. What they have in common is an understanding of the wilderness experience of Israel in which God continually supplied miraculous water as he did bread. Beyond that we are left to our best guesses, although it is not difficult to understand how such a tradition arose, especially in light of the texts noted above (vv. 3–4a) that joined the miraculous bread and water as they referred back to these events.

Thus, Paul seems to be referring to a common tradition of the continual supply of water; but his interest is not in the water itself but in its source, the rock, which he goes on to identify with Christ. Some see in this identification the influence of Philo, or more correctly the Hellenistic Judaism of which Philo is the leading figure, who equated the rock with personified Wisdom. This is based in part on the thoroughly misguided perception that Paul has himself already identified Christ with Wisdom (1:24, 30; q.v.). But such a point of contact with Philo is altogether unlikely. Far more cogent is the suggestion that Paul has made a simple transfer of images from the rock at Horeb to such passages as the Song of Moses in Deut. 32 (vv. 4, 15, 18, 30, 31), where the God of Israel is identified as the Rock, whose ways are just and perfect, yet who was rejected by them in the wilderness (see esp. vv. 15, 18). In any case, by this identification Paul is about to make a point similar to that in the Song of Moses, that even though God had given them “spiritual food,” they rejected Yahweh for their idols.

That Paul now identifies the rock with Christ thus serves his double aim: (1) to emphasize the typological character of Israel’s experience, that it was by Christ himself that they were being nourished in the wilderness; and (2) thereby also to stress the continuity between Israel and the Corinthians, who by their idolatry are in the process of repeating Israel’s madness and thus are in danger of experiencing similar judgment. How much by this identification Paul intended to stress Christ’s preexistence is moot, but it seems far more likely that he uses the verb “was” to indicate the reality of Christ’s presence in the OT events than that he sees him there simply in a figurative way. To be rejected as missing the context altogether is the suggestion that the identification does not have to do with Israel at all, but with the Corinthians: “He is simply saying that Christ is the source of our spiritual sustenance.” No doubt that, too, is finally involved, but the typology carries its clout only if Paul understood it to be true first of all for Israel itself. All the more so, since in the concluding sentence he goes on to “ring the changes” on Israel, and thus bring into focus the reason for this recital of their privileges in the first place.

5 All that has preceded forms a single long sentence in Paul’s Greek, to which this sentence now stands in sharp contrast. “Nevertheless,” he now concludes, despite these sacred privileges similar in kind to yours, including the presence of Christ himself to “nourish” them with “spiritual drink,” the Israelites failed to obtain the prize. Thus he sets in motion the following section in which he will specify the reasons for Israel’s failure and thereby warn his Corinthian friends that their present idolatry can only have similar consequences.

He expresses Israel’s failure in the starkest of forms. “God was not pleased with most of them” (= the vast majority of them!) as is evidenced by the fact that “their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.” The language of this last clause is taken directly from the LXX of Num. 14:16; the picture intended is probably the vivid one of their corpses being “strewn all over the desert,” as the vast majority (all but two in fact!) failed one by one to reach the promised land. Saying that “God was not pleased with the majority of them” is Paul’s way of expressing God’s judgment upon them and their resultant forfeiture of election—despite their privileges. Thus, all of them had experienced something analogous to Christian “baptism” and “Lord’s supper,” yet the vast majority of them also experienced God’s judgment and failed of the prize. Therefore, take heed, which is the point of what comes next (vv. 6–12).

It is easy to get lost in the fascination of texts like these (over the typological understanding of the OT, or the “accompanying rock,” or the preexistent Christ in Israel’s history) and thereby miss the point of the text itself. Each of those other things is there, and they merit our attention and careful study because they put us in touch with Paul’s understanding of the OT as Christian Scripture and of the church as the people of God in the new era. But his own point in all this must not be missed: just as God did not tolerate Israel’s idolatry, so that of the Corinthians will not be tolerated. We deceive ourselves if we think God will tolerate ours.

6Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did. 7Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written: “The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.” 8We should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did—and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died. 9We should not test Christ, as some of them did—and were killed by snakes. 10And do not grumble, as some of them did—and were killed by the destroying angel.

11These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. 12So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall! 13No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.

Exodus 32:6

Some manuscripts test the Lord

The Greek word for temptation and tempted can also mean testing and tested.

This paragraph continues the narration of the events of the exodus in two ways: (1) by explaining that the reason for this review is to warn the Corinthian believers (vv. 6, 11–12), who enjoy blessings even greater than those of Israel and who therefore through their own present idolatry are in danger of incurring similar judgment; and (2) by offering specific reasons (vv. 7–10) for the judgment just narrated (v. 5). That this is to serve in this way seems to be made the more certain by the shift from the fourfold, and emphatic, “all of them,” to the fourfold “some of them.” Thus “all Israel” had the same experiences of redemption, while in each case “some of them” were responsible for the four examples of rejecting Yahweh so that the majority failed to make it to the promised land. The more difficult question is what to make of the four examples. Are they four different reasons for Israel’s failure to reach the promised land, and thus general examples of sin, or do they each reflect in less-than-subtle ways the present problem in Corinth—the Corinthians’ arguing (“grumbling”) against Paul over the right to attend the pagan feasts? As the commentary hopes to show, one can make excellent sense of the argument by assuming the latter. The concluding sentence (v. 13), which stands out like a rock between the warning (v. 12) and the strong prohibition that follows (vv. 14–22), seems to function both to continue the warning and to offer a word of assurance in the midst of warning and exhortation.

6 This sentence serves to tie the examples that follow to the OT analogy that has just preceded. It begins, “Now these things [vv. 1–5] occurred as examples” for us; it concludes with the purpose of the examples: “to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things even as they did,” which anticipates the four further examples that follow [vv. 7–10], each of which comes in the form “Do not [or let us not], even as they did.”

The first clause is particularly important in determining how Paul understood the function of these OT examples. Everyone agrees that they function at least as analogies; the question is whether Paul intended something more, something closer to typology, with a kind of latent prophetic sense to the OT counterparts. To put that in another way, did he intend the clause to read “These things have been made our examples,” or “These things have happened as types of us”? Most likely the answer lies somewhere in between. That is, Israel, as “our fathers,” who had their own form of baptism and Lord’s Table, genuinely prefigures “us.” It was Christ who gave them their “spiritual drink,” just as he does for us. But Paul’s concern is that they not prefigure “us” in the tragic circumstances just narrated (v. 5). Hence there seems to be a typological sense to Israel and its “sacraments,” but an analogical sense to the events used as warning examples. As typology the passage breaks down precisely at the point of warning. Paul does not want what happened to Israel to be repeated in the Corinthians’ case; the danger lies in their repetition of Israel’s sins (vv. 7–10), which if persisted in will then lead to similar judgment.

If that is in fact the case, then the emphasis in the present sentence is based on the analogical character of what has preceded (vv. 1–5). The grammar and language of the clause seem to bear this out. “These things” refer to the two preceding concerns (vv. 1–5): on the one hand, Israel had privileges comparable to those of the Corinthians; on the other hand, most of Israel fell under God’s judgment in the desert and thus failed to obtain their form of the eschatological prize. The verb “became” probably refers not to those events “becoming” examples in the present, but to their “having happened” in the first place so that by divine providence they may now serve to warn the Corinthians. Hence, “these things occurred” precisely so that they may serve as “warning examples for us”; that is, they serve as “our examples” in a negative way, so that we will not be like them.

What comes next, then, are four “examples” (vv. 7–10) of how “privileged” Israel “lusted after evil things,” causing the demise of most of them. Indeed, the common denominator to each example is that they illustrate instances in which “their bodies were scattered in the wilderness” (v. 5). The exegetical question is whether they were chosen because of Israel or because of Corinth; in other words, were they simply chosen at random to illustrate Israel’s fall, and as such became for the Corinthians simply another Pauline sin list, or were they chosen because in a rather precise way they reflect the situation in Corinth? Most likely it is the latter, the first two examples being the keys.

7 This first example is clear evidence (1) that the argument that began in 8:1 has not gone astray; (2) that the problem is idolatry per se, not simply the eating of food purchased in the marketplace; and (3) that the form of idolatry for which the Corinthians were arguing in their letter was freedom to attend the pagan meals in the idol temples (see the introduction to chaps. 8–10). This first example also differs from the three that follow in one significant way. This one illustrates the actual sin by citing the biblical example, thereby giving the content of the “evil thing” but not the form of the judgment; the others merely allude to the exodus event, and do so by way of a concluding “and” clause that spells out their demise. It seems possible, therefore, that Paul intended all four to be understood in the same way, that is, that judgment also accompanied the first example, and that the other examples are to be understood in light of the biblical text alluded to. If that may seem too subtle for some, it may on the other hand indicate that these early Christians, who were not inured to the contemporary media blitz, knew their Bibles better than most moderns do, so that the allusion itself was enough to give them recall of the biblical context.

Thus he begins, “Do not be idolaters, as some of them were.” It might be arguable that this is general parenesis against idolatry, were it not for the text that Paul chooses to cite, Exod. 32:6b: “The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.” More specifically related to “idolatry” per se would have been the preceding sentence, “The people rose up early and sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings” (v. 6a) or a later one (v. 31c), “They made themselves gods of gold.” Instead he chose that portion of the narrative which specifically indicates that the people ate in the presence of the golden calf, thus, along with an earlier and later passage (8:10/10:14–22), specifically identifying the idolatry as a matter of cultic meals in the idol’s presence. The judgment in the case of Israel was the slaying of three thousand by the Levites (Exod. 32:28) and a subsequent plague (v. 35), Paul’s first example (implicit in this case) of “their bodies being scattered in the wilderness” (v. 5).

The final verb, “and [they] got up to indulge in revelry,” is probably also to be understood as part of this concern. Although the verb in the LXX often refers to cultic dancing, and in the exodus narrative the revelry is further expressed in terms of “shouting” (v. 17), “singing” (v. 18), and “dancing” (v. 19), nonetheless in this case (both in the LXX and in Paul) it almost certainly carries overtones of sexual play. This is suggested by the further description of the people’s “breaking loose,” or “running wildly out of control” (v. 25). It was so understood by the rabbis and the early church. Furthermore, in the example that follows eating in the presence of the idol and sexual play are specifically joined in the Numbers narrative (25:1–3). Thus for Paul this verb leads directly to the example of sexual immorality that follows, which is also expressed in the context of cultic eating.

8 This second example, “we should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did,” is also specifically related to the Corinthian situation (see on 5:1–5, 10–11; 6:9–10, 12–20). In this case the question is whether it is a general word against sexual immorality, with the former cases in mind, or whether it suggests that their feasting in the idol temples also at times involved sexual “play.” Although proper caution is in order, there are several hints that the latter might be involved.

First, the OT passage Paul echoes (Num. 25:1–9) specifically joins that particular moment of sexual immorality with eating in the presence of the Baal of Peor. Second, the preceding text also alludes to idolatrous eating joined with sexual play. Third, in the earlier prohibition against prostitution (6:12–20), Paul deliberately reapplied the imagery of the church as God’s “temple” (3:16–17) to the Christian’s body that was being “joined” to a prostitute. Does this perhaps allude to the sexual immorality of that account in connection with the pagan temples? Fourth, the other instances where “idol food” occurs in the NT are explicitly accompanied by a reference to sexual immorality (Acts 15:29; Rev. 2:14, 20); indeed the first instance in the Revelation (2:14) has the same allusion to the passage in Numbers. It is highly probable, therefore, that in each case these two sins really belong together, as they did in the OT and pagan precedents; and thus they also go together at the meals in the pagan temples.

Nonetheless, one cannot be completely certain here. Conzelmann has shown decisively that the temple prostitution in connection with the temple of Aphrodite mentioned in Strabo belonged to a former time. On the other hand, the story narrated in Josephus about the lady Paulina, who “after supper” at the temple had nightlong sex with Mundus, thinking he was the god Anubis, suggests that such possibilities still existed in the shrines of the Hellenistic period.

As with the following two examples, Paul does not here narrate the exodus event itself, nor does he cite a biblical passage in support. Rather, he alludes to the OT narrative by mentioning the specific judgment that occurred. The judgment in this instance involves the infamous case of “the missing thousand,” for which there is not an entirely satisfactory solution. It is possible that Paul had one event in mind (Num. 25:9) but his memory picked up the number from a different event (the number of Levites in Num. 26:62); or perhaps he had access to an otherwise unknown tradition of this event, which seems unlikely here, since all other known Jewish sources have 24,000. In any case, this is the second (first explicit) example of “their bodies being scattered in the wilderness” (v. 5), that is, strewn all over the desert over a considerable length of time—and thus ending with the great indignity of no burial!

9 The third example, “we should not test . . . , as some of them did—and were killed by snakes,” refers to the Israelites’ complaint where they “spoke against God and against Moses” because they had to eat manna rather than more ordinary food (Num. 21:4–7). This example in particular is often seen as the one that begins the move toward a more general parenesis, prompted more by what actually happened in the exodus than by the situation in Corinth. To the contrary, Paul seems especially to have adapted it to their present conflict with him over their “right” to attend the cultic meals in the pagan temples. Two things suggest that this is so.

First, the verb “test” does not appear in the OT narrative at this point, although it does in Ps. 78:18, which apparently refers to this event. Whether or not Paul was influenced by the Psalm, the clue to his usage is to be found not in the OT narrative, but later at the end of the following prohibition against temple attendance (vv. 21–22), where he asks rhetorically in the language of Deut. 32:19, “Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy? Are we stronger than he?” Paul’s point is that the Corinthians’ challenge of his former prohibition against their attending such cultic meals amounts to “putting Christ to the test.”

Second, he refers to it as putting Christ to the test. That “Christ,” not “Lord,” is the word used by Paul is almost certain. This means that Paul once again, as above (v. 4), is purposely tying the situations of Israel and Corinth together christologically. It was Christ whom Israel was testing in the desert. At the same time it is Christ whom the Corinthians are putting to the test by trying to eat both at the Lord’s Table and at the table of demons.

10 This final example was probably prompted by the previous one, in which Israel complained against both God and Moses. In the preceding example the problem with the Corinthians is their “putting Christ to the test”; at issue here is very likely their concomitant “grumbling” against Paul in their letter, who, according to what he had reminded them about earlier (5:9–11), had already forbidden them to engage in idolatry and sexual immorality. This seems to be supported by the OT text alluded to in the judgment clause, either Num. 14:1–38, where the narrative begins with the people “grumbling” against Moses as their leader, or Num. 16:41, where the people grumbled against Moses over God’s judgment against Korah and his followers.

It is difficult to decide between these two passages because in neither case does the narrative refer to the people as being “killed by the destroying angel.” In favor of the Korah narrative (Num. 16) is the large number of people (over 14,700) killed by the plague (hence the association with the destroying angel in that narrative); against it is the fact that the grumbling motif plays such an insignificant part in the narrative. In favor of the passage in Num. 14 is the prominent place of the “grumbling” motif in that narrative; against it is the fact that in this case only a handful died of a plague (v. 37). Perhaps more significantly, and this is what finally is in its favor, this is the passage where the judgment is pronounced that only Joshua, Caleb, and those under twenty would enter the promised land, and from which the earlier language (“scattered in the wilderness,” v. 5) is taken. Using the language of the Destroyer from Exod. 12:23, Paul apparently is alluding to that greater judgment wherein all who had not previously died were condemned to die in the desert. In any case, the grumbling in the OT text is against Moses; and very likely it is the Corinthians’ grumbling against Paul, which, as with Moses, involves grumbling against God, that prompted him to include this final example of judgment.

11 Just as Paul had begun the preceding paragraph (v. 6) with an express statement that “these things” (= vv. 1–5) occurred so that they might function as examples for “us” (esp. the Corinthians), so now he concludes the four examples of judgment in the desert with a similar explicit application: “These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us.” Although the wording has changed from before, the point is the same in both instances, the wording here helping further to clarify what he had said earlier. As before, Israel does not serve as a “type” of the Corinthians; rather, “these things” that have just been narrated “happened to them by way of example.” But they “were written down as warnings for us,” thus indicating their divinely ordained reason for being in Scripture. In this sentence one captures a sense of Paul’s view that both the historical events and the inscripturated narrative are not simply history or isolated texts in Scripture; rather, behind all these things lie the eternal purposes of the living God, who knows the end from the beginning, and who therefore has woven the prefigurement into these earlier texts for the sake of God’s final eschatological people.

With the final clause, “on whom the culmination of the ages has come,” Paul once again sets everything into his thoroughly eschatological perspective (see esp. on 4:1–5 and 6:1–5). If the precise nuance of the wording itself is not certain, there is little question about Paul’s present concern. Through his death and resurrection Jesus Christ marks the turning of the ages; the old is on its way out, the new has begun (2 Cor. 5:17). He has set the future irresistibly in motion; and the new people of God, whether Jew or Gentile, bond or free, male or female, who belong to God by grace alone, are the people of the End, “on whom the culmination of the ages has come” and “toward whom all history has had its goal.” That is what constitutes the typological element in these OT stories; ultimately the whole OT has been pointing toward its eschatological fulfillment in God’s new people. And that is why the OT is their book in particular—because it has Christ as its prime actor and final goal. This does not mean that Israel, or its history, was not important in its own right, but that they stand at the beginning of the promises of God that are now finding fulfillment at the end of the ages. Thus all of these now exist in written form for “our” sakes, to warn “us” not to be like them; for Christ’s people stand at the end of history, at the time when God is bringing all of the divine purposes into focus and fulfillment in Christ.

12 With another strongly inferential “so then,” Paul brings this review of Israel’s history to its conclusion by directly applying these warnings to the Corinthian situation. The person who “thinks” they “are standing firm” refers back to the beginning (vv. 1–4), to those who think their participation in the Christian sacraments has placed them above danger in regard to attending the cultic temple meals—especially since they also have argued that such “gods” have no real existence (8:4–6). The warning, which began with the analogies at the end of the first round (9:24–27), is that they, too, might “fall,” just as the Israelites who had their own form of “sacraments.” This can only mean that the Corinthians, too, as Israel, may fail of the eschatological prize, in this case eternal salvation (see on 6:9–11). Their way of placing themselves in this jeopardy is through their idolatry, which will finally be spelled out in the strongest form of prohibition in the next paragraph (vv. 14–22). But before that, and in typical fashion, Paul cannot bring himself to end all of this on such a strong word of threat. Hence he breaks the argument at this point with a corresponding word of encouragement (v. 13)—and the only sentence in the entire passage that has had an enduring life in the contemporary church(!).

13 These final sentences of the paragraph are among the better known in this letter, having served generations of Christians as a word of hope in times of difficulty. Unfortunately it is also usually cited in isolation from its present context—understandably so, since it is difficult for almost any reader to see how it fits into the scheme of the present argument, especially since the application to come (v. 14) so nicely follows what has preceded (vv. 1–12). The best solution seems to be to regard it as functioning in two directions at once, both as a continuation of the preceding warning (vv. 1–12) and as a word of assurance leading to the prohibition to “flee from idolatry” (v. 14). There is no risk of their falling, Paul seems to be telling them in response to what he has just said, as long as one is dealing with ordinary trials; God will help them through such. But they must, “therefore, flee from idolatry” (v. 14) because by implication there is no divine aid when one is “testing” Christ in the way they currently are doing (v. 9); such activity is decidedly not in the category of “everyday trials.”

Thus, following hard on the heels of the warning to “be careful that you don’t fall” (v. 12), Paul reassures his Corinthian friends that they need not fall, at least not in the vicissitudes of Christian life common to all. The eternal God has already made a divine commitment to them when it comes to everyday human trials: “No temptation [or trial] has overtaken you except what is common to mankind,” that is, “to our human condition.” The “trial” or “temptation” probably harks back to the sins enumerated earlier (vv. 7–10), but now against the backdrop of the larger “trial” that such Gentile converts in Corinth must have undergone through their conversion to this new religion out of the East (cf. esp. 1 Thess. 2:1–3:10). By persisting in attendance at the cultic meals with pagan friends they have put themselves in grave danger of “falling”; but the “temptation” (cf. ) to do so as part of the “trial” of their new life in Christ is not of such a nature that they must succumb to it.

The divine alternative to succumbing that Paul offers is to remind them of God’s prior faithfulness on their behalf. When it comes to the trials common to this human life, “God is faithful” (see on 1:9), meaning God can be counted on to help them, and this in two ways. First, God has pledged “not to let you be tempted/tested beyond what you can bear.” This, of course, speaks not only to the fact of God’s prior activity in behalf of his people, Paul’s emphasis, but also to the fact that they will be called upon to endure. They must be prepared for “a long obedience in the same direction.” In his own faithfulness God has pledged not to allow what is beyond that endurance.

Second, and as the other side of the same coin, “when you are tempted, God will also provide the way out (or make an end) so that you can stand up under it.” This sounds like a contradiction in terms: finding “the way out” so that you can “continue to bear it.” But the problem lies only in the less-than-precise wording. There is a “way out of,” or “end to,” whatever testing one may undergo; but that is to be seen from the divine perspective. One may yet have much to endure before the “end” is realized. In any case, one may trust the faithful God to provide the “end” to a test that has not necessarily had divine origins, but that God has “allowed,” as it were.

Paul’s point, then, is that in ordinary human trials one can expect divine aid. There is no danger of “falling” here. But it is otherwise with idolatry. The “way out” in that case is simply put: “Therefore, flee from idolatry,” which is the concern of what Paul says next.

The concluding affirmation of this paragraph helps to put things into perspective. The warning, based on the tragic examples of Israel, is straightforward and powerful. Some sins are so incompatible with life in Christ that sure judgment, meaning loss of salvation, is the inevitable result of persistence in them. These are not matters of being “taken in,” as it were, by temptation, thus falling into sin. These are deliberate acts, predicated on a false security, that put God to the test, as though daring God to judge one who has been “baptized” into Christ. Such heady disobedience, Paul assures us, is headed for destruction. But on the other side is the faithful God, ready to aid those enduring trial, assuring them that there is a way out, an end to it. And in the meantime God is there to apportion the necessary ability to endure, appropriate to the trial, to which our appropriate response is, “thanks be to God!”

14Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. 15I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. 16Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? 17Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all share the one loaf.

18Consider the people of Israel: Do not those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? 19Do I mean then that food sacrificed to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? 20No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. 21You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons. 22Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

With this paragraph Paul finally brings to a conclusion the long argument with the Corinthians that began with his forbidding them to go to the temples to join in the idolatrous feasts (8:1). As was suggested earlier, the apparently circuitous route Paul has taken in order finally to reach this prohibition is probably due to the nature of their contention with him in their letter, which itself most likely set the agenda for Paul’s response. In any case, the way the argument opens (8:4–6, including the citations from their letter), the specific expression of the problem that followed (8:10), and the immediately preceding argument (vv. 1–13) all lead directly to this paragraph.

In a way similar to a preceding argument (6:12–20, esp. v. 18), Paul finally asserts an absolute prohibition against idolatry (v. 14). Then in an appeal to their good sense (v. 15) he explains from their own experience of the Lord’s Table (vv. 16–17) and from the OT sacred meals (v. 18) that the same realities carry over to the pagan meals (vv. 19–20), which therefore makes participation in one meal absolutely incompatible with participation in the other (v. 21). All of which ends on the rhetorical note that, just as with Israel’s idolatry (v. 9), by their current behavior they are “testing” Christ, provoking him to jealousy (v. 22).

The basis of Paul’s prohibition is twofold: (1) His understanding of the sacred meal as “fellowship,” as the unique sharing of believers in the worship of the deity, who was also considered to be present; (2) His understanding, based on the OT, of idolatry as a locus of the demonic.

It should be noted that these two bases for the prohibition bring closure to the two basic arguments from their letter: (1) that, since an idol is not real, not only is it of little consequence what we eat, but where should be of no concern as well, and (2) that as long as we participate in our own sacred meal, we remain secure in Christ. In the preliminary qualification of the content of their knowledge (8:4–6), Paul had allowed that for the pagans there are “many gods and many lords,” and that for some, these “gods” still had some measure of subjective reality. Now he asserts that they do have reality indeed, but not as “gods”; rather, these “deities” are in fact the habitation of demons. In the immediately preceding argument (vv. 1–13), Paul had pointed out on the basis of the divinely established example of Israel that there is no inherent safety in the sacraments. Now he moves beyond that to demonstrate the absolute incompatibility of eating both sacred meals. The kind of “fellowship” involved eliminates any such possibility.

14 With a very strong inferential “therefore,” Paul brings the preceding argument to its logical conclusion. In what has preceded (vv. 1–12) he showed by way of example that Israel’s “idolatry” had caused their overthrow in the desert, despite their regular partaking of a “divine meal.” Having warned Corinth of the same possibility (vv. 11–12), he now concludes with both a tender appeal, “my dear friends,” and a straightforward prohibition, “flee from idolatry.” The appeal is an appropriate one to follow the prior word of warning and assurance (v. 13). “God will provide a way out of genuine trials,” he assures them, but “my dearly loved brothers and sisters, that does not include headlong pursuit of idolatry.” This usage is reminiscent of an earlier moment (4:14), where after a long and frequently combative argument with them, Paul uses similar language to remind them that they are his dear children—despite the vigor with which he has had to argue with them. The word for “idolatry” is the equivalent of the personal noun “idolators” used earlier (5:10–11 and 10:7; cf. 6:9), suggesting both that eating in the temple precincts is involved (10:7) and probably that Paul had previously forbidden the practice in his earlier letter (5:9). On the use of such a prohibition following a primarily theological argument, note two earlier moments in this letter (6:18 and 8:13).

15 The preceding prohibition (v. 14) is both abrupt and absolute. Now Paul seeks to show them how sensible it is, based on their own experience of the Lord’s Table. Since the Corinthians had prided themselves in their understanding of things, and surely had intimated as much in their letter to him, Paul allows: “I speak as to sensible people.” Although he had earlier used this same language in biting irony (4:10), it seems less likely that he intends it so here. Similar to an earlier instance (5:3) the “as” refers to an actual reality, not a merely hypothetical one. Since they are sensible people by their own admission, he chooses here, as he will again later (in 11:13 and 14:20), to appeal to them as such: “judge for yourselves what I say,” meaning in this case, “what I am about to say.” But he does not mean “judge for yourselves” as to its rightness or wrongness. They are to judge for themselves that their apostle is right!

16 This is one of two passages (along with 11:17–34) where Paul refers to the Lord’s Supper. For that reason it has received an understandably large amount of attention. In this case it is especially important to observe that this meal is not the present focus of Paul’s concern; rather the focus here is on the sacred pagan meals soon to be addressed (vv. 19–21). What is said here thus serves as the presupposition for what he will say later. On the basis of their (probably) common, and for Paul proper, understanding of the nature of their own sacred meal, as well as a biblical understanding of that of Israel (v. 18), he appeals to their common sense as to why they may not attend the pagan meals, precisely because this could only be considered a form of idolatry. That means, therefore, that here one can indeed learn a great deal about Paul’s understanding of the Lord’s Table, but since his focus is only on what is genuinely similar between the two meals, not everything can be learned here.

What he argues is that there is something inherent in the nature of the Christian meal that makes participation in the other absolutely incompatible. That something he describes as koinōnia (“fellowship, participation”). Precisely what he intended by that term is problematic; at the same time it is the focal point of one of the deep rifts within the Christian church—namely, over the proper understanding of the nature of the Christian sacred meal and of the relationship with Christ that inheres in it. The problem has to do with whether Paul’s point—or emphasis—is that in sacred meals one has koinōnia with the deity (in the Christian’s case, with Christ himself), or with fellow participants in the meal as they worship the deity by sacrifice and by eating in the deity’s honor. Most likely the solution lies somewhere in between. The linguistic and literary evidence indicates that koinōnia has to do with the worshipers themselves; but the basis and focus of their worship was the deity, who in most cases was considered to be in some way present among them.

First, then, there can be little doubt that Paul intends to emphasize the kind of bonding relationship of the worshipers with one another that this meal expresses; indeed, the next sentence (v. 17) seems to make this certain. It should be noted that the present sequence, cup–bread, is unique to the NT. The evidence from later on (11:23–25), however, makes it clear that the standard sequence, bread–cup, prevailed in the Pauline churches. The reason for the unusual order, therefore, seems to be that Paul has chosen here to interpret the bread in light of the present argument, an interpretation that emphasizes the solidarity of the fellowship of believers created by their all sharing “the one loaf.”

At the same time, however, the distinctively religious nature of these feasts indicates that worship of the deity was involved, and therefore that they most likely considered the deity also to be present in some way at the meal. This is especially so in Judaism, in which the Israelites are expressly commanded to eat “in the presence of Yahweh.” This at least means in his sanctuary; since sacrifice preceded the meal, Yahweh himself was probably understood to be “present” at that meal in a unique way. So also in the pagan meals, since at least one of the papyrus invitations suggests that the god himself will act as host. But this is especially true of the Christian meal. Not only did Jesus himself host the first of such meals, but the early church understood him to be present by the Spirit in their gatherings (cf. 5:3–5). This is most likely how we are also to understand their use of the prayer Marana tha (see on 16:22).

But what the evidence does not seem to allow is a sacramental understanding of the meal itself, as if they were “participating in the Lord” by the actual eating of the food, as though the food were the Lord himself. Neither the language and grammar nor the example of Israel nor the examples from the pagan meals allow such a meaning. The “fellowship,” therefore, was most likely a celebration of their common life in Christ, based on the new covenant in his blood that had previously bound them together in union with Christ by his Spirit. But while their “fellowship” was with one another, its basis and focus were in Christ, his death and resurrection; they were thus together in his presence, where as host at his table Christ shared anew with them the benefits of the atonement. It is this unique relationship between believers and with their Lord, celebrated at this meal, that makes impossible similar associations with other “believers” at the tables of demons. In this passage the cup seems to focus on the vertical dimension, the bread on the horizontal (cf. v. 21).

Thus Paul begins with the cup: “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ?” The NIV translators chose to render “the cup of blessing” as “the cup of thanksgiving,” apparently because that has become the more common word for the Christian understanding of this meal (cf. 11:24), and it thus became a kind of fixed feature in most Protestant celebrations of this meal. Unfortunately, however, that rendering causes one to miss the rich Jewish background of this language. “Blessings” offered to the Creator for his bounty were a common part of Jewish meals. The “cup of blessing” was the technical term for the final blessing offered at the end of the meal. This was the cup that our Lord blessed at the Last Supper (cf. 11:25, “after supper”) and interpreted as “the new covenant in my blood.” Hence the early church took over the language of this blessing to refer to the cup of the Lord’s Table, adding only that it is “the cup of blessing which we bless,” to distinguish it from all others, especially the “cup of demons” (v. 21).

Paul’s concern, of course, is that the drinking of this cup is for believers “a sharing in the blood of Christ.” As noted above, there is little evidence that the food of sacred meals was understood to be an eating of the deity. Since, therefore, the cup is specifically interpreted by the Lord (cf. Mark 14:24), and continued to be so understood in the early church (1 Cor. 11:25), as “my blood of the new covenant,” this language almost certainly refers to their sharing in the provisions and benefits of that covenant. This also means that they did not consider their table to be an altar where sacrifice was taking place, but a fellowship meal where in the presence of the Spirit they were by faith looking back to the singular sacrifice that had been made and were thus realizing again its benefits in their lives. In this way they shared “in the blood of Christ.” Paul’s own point, seldom noted in the contemporary church, is that the Corinthian believers’ being thus joined together in Christ through his blood makes it impossible for them also to join pagan meals where the focus was equally on the “deity” involved—although Paul must go on to explain that the nonexistent deity does in fact have reality, as a demon.

Similarly, Paul speaks of “the bread that we break.” This also picks up the language of the Jewish meal and was used by the earliest believers to designate their fellowship meal (cf. Acts 2:46; 20:7, 11). What is unique here is that Paul will go on to interpret the bread in terms of the church as Christ’s “body.” Nowhere else in the NT is the bread interpreted at all. Paul does so here probably because in this context the emphasis lies here. Thus he does not mean that by eating the bread believers have some kind of mystical “participation in” the “broken body” of Christ, but, as he clearly interprets next, they are herewith affirming that through Christ’s death they are “partners” in the redeemed community, the new eschatological people of God.

17 In some ways Paul’s sentence looks as if he were taking a momentary digression, perhaps anticipating the problem to be addressed a bit later (11:17–34) and thus taking a sideswipe at their divisiveness. But since the sequence cup–bread most likely came about precisely for the sake of this explanatory word, it probably is crucial to our understanding of the present argument. This explanation is what indicates most strongly that koinōnia refers to the common sharing in the Lord’s Supper that binds them together as a unique, eschatological community. Their singular existence as the people of God, bound together to their Lord through the benefits of the cross and experienced regularly at his table, makes all other such meals idolatry. Paul’s point, therefore, is not the unity of the body that this meal represents (although it probably anticipates that concern as well), but the solidarity of the redeemed community as one body in Christ that forbids all other such unions.

He makes that point using the analogy of the bread. In a chiastic pattern, whose logic is not as clear as the actual point being made, he says:

Because there is

one loaf,

A

we who are many are

one body;

B

for

we all partake

B′

of the

one loaf.

A′

The first clause is a direct reflection on the final words that have just preceded. At the table they all share a common loaf, which the Lord had identified as his “body” (cf. 11:24). Paul now asserts that the “body” in that identification is to be understood analogically as the church, who even though they “are many” are “one body” because there is one loaf at the table. Even though the analogy is clear, the logic of that sentence is not immediate, so he adds the explanation, “for we all partake of the one loaf.” By common “participation” in the single loaf, the “body of Christ,” they affirm that they together make up the “body of Christ,” which in turn implies that they may not likewise become partners in similar associations that honor demons. He is not thereby suggesting that they become that body through this meal; a bit later (12:13) he says that happened through their common “immersion” in the Spirit. Rather, by this meal they affirm what the Spirit has already brought about through the death and resurrection of Christ. On the use of the “body” metaphor for the believing community, see further on 11:29 and 12:12–13.

18 As earlier (9:13–14), but now in reverse order, Paul adds the further analogy of the sacred meals in Israel. “Consider the people of Israel,” he says, intending to argue his case one step further. “Are not those who eat the sacrifices koinōnoi (partners, sharers, participants) in the altar?” The context indicates that Paul is referring to the meals prescribed in the OT (Deut. 14:22–27), not to the priests’ share of the sacrifice alluded to earlier (9:13). The language “eat the sacrifices” refers to the meal that followed the actual sacrifice, in which they together ate portions of the sacrificed food. Since there is not the remotest hint in Judaism that the sacrificial food represented God in some way, Paul can only mean by “sharers in the altar” that the participants shared together in the food on the altar. Paul’s emphasis seems to be that by this meal they were thus bound together in their common worship of Yahweh. By analogy such people were not allowed also to join the sacrificial meals of their neighbors, and when they did so, it was clearly considered idolatry (cf. vv. 7–8).

The probable reason for this second example is that it is more closely analogous to the pagan meals, which also involved sacrifice, followed by a meal in which the sacrificial food was eaten. The Christian meal was only an analogy of a sacred meal; their sacrifice had been offered once-for-all, and though now celebrated at the meal, was not a part of the meal, as in the Jewish and pagan meals.

19 Paul now proceeds to apply the preceding analogies (vv. 16–18), but does so (rhetorically) by going back to the argument of their letter. They have argued that eating idol food, meaning eating meals at the temples, cannot have any bearing on one’s Christian life, since there is only one God, which in turn means that an idol cannot have genuine reality (8:4). Since Paul has been arguing that there is religious significance to the Lord’s Table and to the sacrificial meals of Israel, he must now qualify their argument in light of that reality. “Do I mean then” by the preceding argument “that sacrificial food is anything”? Of course not, is the intended response. That we “share in the blood and body of Christ” is not to be understood that there is genuine significance to the food eaten at pagan meals, as if it were actually sacrificed to a “god.” Nor does he mean to imply that “an idol is anything.” No, on this point they are agreed; an idol has no reality, in the sense that an idol does not in fact represent what might truly be called a “god.” But what the Corinthians have failed to discern right along is that to say an idol is not a god does not mean that it does not represent supernatural powers. Indeed, it is quite the opposite, as he will now go on to explain next.

20 To the contrary, Paul says, the preceding argument does not imply reality to idols. Rather, the Corinthians are to understand idolatry in terms of OT revelation: “The sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to a being who might rightly be termed God.” By changing the tense of the verb, Paul contemporizes the language of the Song of Moses (Deut. 32:17). Israel in the desert had rejected God their Rock for beings who were no gods, indeed who were demons. Although the OT itself contains no theological reflection on this understanding of idolatry, almost certainly it was the natural development of Israel’s realization that the “mute” gods of the pagans did in fact have supernatural powers. Since there was only one God, such power could not be attributed to a god; hence the belief arose that idols represented demonic spirits.

From that piece of revelation Paul proceeds to apply the stinger: “And I do not want you to be koinōnous (sharers, partners) in demons.” Here the argument from the Table of the Lord, as well as the additional argument from Israel’s history, now comes into perspective. The food eaten at the pagan meals has been sacrificed to demons; that means that those at the table are sharers in what has been sacrificed to demons in the same way that Israel shared in what had been sacrificed to God. Since at the Lord’s Table no sacrifice is now involved, it took the additional illustration from Israel to give clarity to this present assertion. Paul’s point is simple: These pagan meals are in fact sacrifices to demons; the worship of demons is involved. One who is already bound to one’s Lord and to one’s fellow believers through participation at the Lord’s Table cannot under any circumstances also participate in the worship of demons. That point will be made explicit in the parallel sentences that follow.

21 But Paul does not merely “not want” them to be participants in the demonic. Using the starkest kind of language he asserts: “You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot share at the Table of the Lord and the table of demons.” These words function as both warning and prohibition. They warn in terms of the following rhetorical questions (v. 22); they prohibit in the sense of pointing out the absolute incompatibility of the two actions. One is not merely eating with friends at the pagan temples; one is engaged in idolatry, idolatry that involves an association with demons.

One should not make more of rhetoric than an author intends. But it is noteworthy that Paul pronounces this prohibition in terms of the two elements of the Lord’s Table, in the sequence given above (v. 16). First, one “drinks the cup of the Lord”; therefore, one may not likewise “drink the cup of demons.” The parallel in this case does not rest with a cup at pagan meals known as the “cup of Sarapis” or the like. The language is taken from the Christian meal, and in particular drinking the cup of the Lord points to the vertical dimension of that meal, that is, to the binding covenantal relationship one has with Christ through the benefits of his “blood.” By analogy one cannot likewise have such a relationship with the “demon” Sarapis. The two are mutually exclusive.

Second, one “shares in the table of the Lord.” This echoes Paul’s earlier language (vv. 16b–17), where the focus is on the horizontal dimension of the table. Those who eat at the Lord’s Table, proclaiming his death until he comes (11:26), are thereby also bound to one another through the death of the Lord that is thus celebrated. So also with pagans. Theirs is a sacred “fellowship” in honor of demons. Those who are bound to one another through Christ cannot also become “fellows” (= be in partnership) with those whose meals are consecrated to demons.

22 This final set of questions brings the argument as it was resumed at the beginning (10:1) to its conclusion as a strong word of warning. The questions are joined to the preceding sentence by an untranslated “or,” which implies that it offers some kind of alternative to what was just said. Most likely Paul intends: “Or will you continue eating at both meals, and thus arouse the Lord’s jealousy, as Israel did in the desert?” That is put in the form of a rhetorical question, “Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy?” With these words Paul continues the allusion to the Song of Moses (in this case to Deut. 32:21) begun earlier (v. 4) and carried further in the preceding emphatic disclaimer (v. 20), where precisely for its idolatry Israel was rejected by the Lord. The term “jealousy” is a reflection of the OT motif of God’s self-revelation (Exod. 20:5), related to his holiness and power, in which God is to be understood as so absolutely without equal that he will brook no rivals to Israel’s undivided devotion.

The precise intent of the final question, “Are we stronger than he?” is more puzzling. Most likely this is the final warning that God’s “jealousy” cannot be challenged with impunity. Those who would put God to the test by insisting on their right to what Paul insists is idolatry are in effect taking God on, challenging him by their actions, daring God to act. Secure in their own foolhardiness, they think of themselves as so “strong” that they can challenge Christ himself (cf. Isa. 45:9–10). But their folly, implied in an earlier exhortation (9:25) and given in the preceding warning (10:12), is that they will thereby fail to gain the final eschatological prize. In any event, the question calls for “an emphatic negative response.”

The argument has now come full circle. For modern readers it may seem terribly convoluted; but it probably was not at all so for its first readers, for whom this was a response to their letter. The issue has been singular. They were arguing for the right to attend pagan feasts and were trying to “build up” others by having them attend as well. Paul says No. Not only is the latter action totally unloving—and Christian behavior is based on love, not knowledge—but the action itself is totally incompatible with life in Christ as it is celebrated at the Lord’s Table. Thus he appeals, exhorts, and finally warns that such attendance is absolutely forbidden. But the matter is not completely finished. Not everything is absolute; there are still matters of indifference—even about things that are tangentially idolatrous. So Paul must yet speak to the issue of “rights” and “freedom” on those matters, which is the concern of the final section (10:23–11:1).

In a variety of ways this paragraph has continued to be a Word for the church. Converts in Third World settings, of course, often have an immediacy with it that many others do not, as they struggle over the religious intent of meals of various kinds, sometimes even in their ancestral homes, where the meal is eaten in honor of the “god.” In Western churches interest in the text has usually been over the reversed order of cup and bread (vv. 16–17)—with some passing historical interest in the rest—which probably says far more about us than it does about them(!). What Paul is finally forbidding is any kind of relationship with the demonic. How that translates into modern Western cultures may be moot; probably what most Western Christians need to learn is that the demonic is not as remote as some of us would wish to believe.

But at a much deeper level is the hermeneutical issue raised by H. F. von Soden, who suggested that Paul does not really forbid temple attendance per se, but only that which has as its clear intent the worship of idol-demons. He argued that Paul throughout is trying to move both the weak and strong beyond their present positions, by reforming the “magical” view of the sacrament held by the strong (= improper sacramentalism) but at the same time rejecting any legal regulation imposed by the weak (= legalism). While these are proper concerns, it is especially doubtful that this is Paul’s intent here. Rather, the concern is between what is in fact absolute and what are merely adiaphora (matters of indifference) for those who have been radicalized by their new existence in Christ.

Without returning to law, meaning law as a means to right standing with God, the Christian faith has inherent within it something so radical that it absolutizes certain behavior. Being members of one body in Christ makes it quite impossible to be involved in idolatrous practices. Fundamental allegiance is at stake. One cannot serve God and mammon—or demons, whatever form they may take in our modern world. Sitting at the table and experiencing its benefits of grace and freedom does not give one license for religious or moral licentiousness. Rather, it binds us to one another in common fellowship around Christ and the new covenant in such a way that our behavior in the new age is radicalized toward “the law of Christ” (9:21).

23“I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but not everything is constructive. 24No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.

25Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, 26for, “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.”

27If an unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience. 28But if someone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, both for the sake of the one who told you and for the sake of conscience—29I am referring to the other person’s conscience, not yours. For why is my freedom being judged by another’s conscience? 30If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for?

31So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. 32Do not cause anyone to stumble, whether Jews, Greeks or the church of God—33even as I try to please everyone in every way. For I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved. 1Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.

Psalm 24:1

Paul has now basically finished his argument with the Corinthians over the assertions in their letter related to attendance at temple meals. But some loose threads must still be tied together. Eating sacrificial food at the temple meals is absolutely forbidden because it involves the worship of idol-demons. But marketplace idol food, which apparently Paul himself had been known to eat (cf. 9:19–23) and for which he had been judged (9:3; 10:29), is another matter altogether.

It has been common to see Paul as now returning to the issue raised earlier (8:1–11), as though that, too, were dealing with marketplace food. But the difficulties with such a view seem insurmountable. What needs to be noted here is how little of what is essential to the earlier argument carries over to this passage. Only the words “edify” (NIV, “is constructive”) and “conscience” are repeated, plus the concept of “offending,” and in this case the concern over conscience is so different from before that one has to posit a different audience (the “weak”) in order to make sense of it. Moreover, the truly essential items from before are all missing: idols, idol food, knowledge, the “weak,” temple attendance. Rather, he now deals only with food, food sold in the meat market, although what lies behind this concern is obviously the possibility that some of this food had previously been consecrated to idols—or perhaps butchered by pagan priests.

But the real issues seem to lie deeper than the mere question of eating food. Both the nature of the Corinthians’ argument for eating at the temples (8:1, 4, 8) and their criticism of Paul (9:1–3, 19–23) have revealed a basic confusion between absolutes and adiaphora (nonessentials). They had tried to make temple attendance an adiaphoron; for Paul it was an absolute because it was a form of idolatry. At the same time they had confused the true basis for Christian behavior. For them it was a question of knowledge and rights (gnōsis and exousia). For Paul it is a question of love and freedom (agapē and eleutheria). Knowledge and rights lead to pride; they are ultimately not Christian values because the bottom line is selfishness—the “right” to do as I please when I please. Love and freedom lead to edification; they are ultimately Christian behavioral values because the bottom line is the benefit of someone else—that they may be saved (v. 33).

Paul now addresses these issues by using concrete examples from food purchased in the meat market. Two settings are envisioned: food purchased for eating in one’s own domicile (vv. 25–26), and invitations to meals in someone else’s (vv. 27–29a). In the argument as a whole, however, these seem to serve basically to illustrate the greater issue: exousia and freedom with regard to nonessentials. Thus Paul has two concerns: (1) to establish that one is truly free in matters that are adiaphora, regarding which as a follower of Christ he would now include circumcision (7:19) and the observance of special days (Rom. 14:5; Col. 2:16), as well as the matter of food addressed here. (2) Yet personal freedom, as important as that is for Paul, is not the summum bonum of the Christian life. Seeking the good of others is. Hence the concrete examples of freedom are sandwiched between parenesis on benefiting others (vv. 23–24, 31–11:1), and even one of the concrete examples is qualified by a hypothetical situation in which one should forbear for the sake of another (vv. 28–29a). Thus, even though truly Christian conduct is not regulated by the law, neither is it based on the exousia for which the Corinthians have been contending (v. 23). What rules is “freedom” set in the context of “benefit” and “edification” on the one hand (vv. 23–24, 32–33), and the glory of God on the other (v. 31).

Because Paul is working his way through these two issues simultaneously, and also because he has some personal investment in these matters, the later reader here encounters some difficult jumps in the logic of the argument. This is especially true of the initial imperative (v. 25), which does not naturally follow the preceding admonition (v. 24)—indeed, it seems to abandon it altogether—and at the later explanation (vv. 29b–30), which seems to respond in some way to its preceding qualification (v. 29a), yet in content is a defense of the concrete example set forth earlier (vv. 25–26). The best solution to this matter seems to be to view the whole as a kind of chiasmus, alternating between the two concerns (personal freedom and the benefit of others). Thus:

A (23–24) The criterion: the good of others;

B (25–27) Personal freedom with regard to food;

C (28–29a) The criterion illustrated:

freedom curtailed for the sake of another;

B′ (29b–30) Personal freedom defended;

A′ (31–11:1) The criterion generalized: that all may be saved.

23 These opening words, which pick up language used earlier (6:12), appear as abruptly in the present argument as the earlier one did following the issue of lawsuits among believers (6:1–11), and as there, they signal a new topic. The fact that Paul begins both with the identical panta exestin (“all things are permitted”), which in both cases he immediately qualifies, has caused the more recent translations into English to assume, rightly so, that he is again quoting from their letter. But the topic is not totally new. One of the loose ends from the preceding argument was the Corinthians’ insistence on exousia (“rights”), especially as that is related to Paul’s own freedom to eat food sold in the meat market which very well may have been sacrificed to idols (see on 9:19–23). But what follows is not simply a defense of his actions on this matter; rather, he is about to set up his own attitudes toward this food as a model for all Christian behavior, which he insists goes back to Christ himself (11:1).

Thus he begins by taking up the matter of exousia once again, and the slogan under which they have been operating: “Everything is permissible,” which the NIV translators have rendered (helpfully so) as “ ‘I have the right to do anything,’ you say.” As in its earlier occurrence (6:12), the slogan receives a double qualification, the first of which is an exact duplication of the former: “but not everything is beneficial.” In the present case, however, in contrast to its earlier use, there is no ambiguity as to what this means. It refers to what is beneficial for someone else. This is made clear by the second qualification, which does not make a new point but reinforces the first: “but not everything is constructive.” Together the two qualifications in effect bring their view of exousia to its knees. For the Corinthians exousia meant the “right” to act in freedom when and wherever they saw fit. For Paul, as with his own exousia already argued for (9:12 and 18), where it meant the “right” to become slave of all, here the “right” is to “benefit” and “build up” others in the body. For him nothing else is genuine exousia.

24 The preceding qualifications of exousia are now reiterated in the form of general parenesis: “No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.” This is the first appearance of this formula in Paul’s letters, but it is so basic to his understanding of Christian ethics that it probably had long been part of the instructions he gave to his churches. In two later instances (Rom. 15:1–3; Phil. 2:4–5) he bases such a stance on the example of Christ, which is precisely how he concludes the present argument (10:33–11:1); later in the letter he will use the same formula as part of his description of love (13:5). For Paul the death of Christ, in which he gave himself “for us,” is not only God’s offer of pardon for sinners, but also the only proper model of discipleship. Hence “freedom” does not mean “to seek what pleases me,” not even “my own good”; rather it means to be free in Christ in such a way that one can truly seek to benefit and build up another person.

25 In light of the emphasis in the preceding criterion, the reader is not quite prepared for the “applications” that now follow. One might expect illustrations of forbearance for the sake of others; what we get instead are two concrete examples of personal freedom with regard to the meat market, which are finally defended rhetorically in a very personal way at the end (vv. 29b–30). Only in the preceding example of forbearance (vv. 28–29a) is there an expression of concern for others. How does one account for this kind of argumentation?

Most often it is either stated or assumed that Paul’s real point is the example of forbearance itself (vv. 28–29a). More likely the real concern of the entire paragraph is personal freedom with regard to adiaphora. On these matters one is truly free, especially in matters of food, since in the prayer of benediction alluded to in the concluding question (v. 30), one acknowledges that the ultimate origin of all food, no matter who butchered it or where it appeared in process, is God alone (which is the point of the supporting text in v. 26). On the other hand, since such freedom is not the ultimate good in a believer’s life, one may therefore also freely abstain in contexts where someone else is concerned. That seems to be why he begins with the preceding parenesis (v. 24), because even in matters of personal freedom this must always be in view. But what this parenesis does not do is to lead to rules or obligations of abstinence as a general matter of course. Hence he begins with the criterion of the good of others; but he now proceeds to establish that freedom really is that—freedom—and one’s own personal life is not to be judged by others.

Paul’s “rule” for everyday life in Corinth is a simple one: “Eat anything sold in the meat market (macellum) without raising questions of conscience.” The reason for addressing this issue is that what was sold in the macellum often contained meat butchered by the priests, much of it having been part of the pagan sacrifices. Since such meat was expressly forbidden to Jews, and since in their earliest days followers of “the Way” were considered to be a sect of the Jews, the whole issue of a believer’s relationship to the meat market was a thorny one. As with circumcision, Paul takes a decidedly “liberal” stance on this issue. If the Jewish law allowed one to eat meat before it was offered to the idols but not afterward, Paul contended that its ultimate source was God alone (v. 26) and that it was therefore irrelevant whether it had been sacrificed or not.

Thus he tells the Corinthians, all of them, to “buy and eat” and to do so “without raising questions of conscience.” Apparently it was possible in some cases, indeed it was required of the Jews, to investigate whether the meat in the macellum had been previously sacrificed; so Paul is telling the Corinthians not to conduct such inquiries. Meat is meat; buy and eat. On the other hand, since exactly the same phrase occurs in the second example (v. 27), where such an “inquiry” would be less appropriate, it may be that he intends something more like the NIV: Not only do not conduct an investigation, but simply buy and eat without letting it be an issue. The implication is that, since God does not care, neither should you.

But what does Paul mean by (lit.) “for conscience’ sake”? On this question there has been a division of the house. Some have argued that the whole participial phrase means that for the sake of their own conscience one should not conduct such an inquiry. That is, the best way not to create trouble for oneself is not to investigate. But that usually assumes either that Paul is addressing the “weak” or that the real issue is “conscience” as such, either of which seems to miss Paul’s present concern altogether. Rather, he is contending that “conscience” is not involved at all, so an inquiry is irrelevant. Thus, do not raise any questions “for conscience’ sake” because this matter lies outside the concerns of conscience altogether.

26 With this clause Paul goes on to give the basis for his liberal stance of freedom. Scripture itself supports such a view: “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it” (Ps. 24:1). This is the passage used by the rabbis to support the contention that a blessing must be said over every meal. Since “the earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it,” one must bless God for one’s food; otherwise it is as though one were defrauding the Almighty. By this citation, therefore, Paul is almost certainly reflecting the Jewish use of this text for the blessings over meals, especially since he refers again to the “thanksgiving” in the final rhetorical question (v. 30).

But what Paul does here is full of irony toward his Jewish heritage, whether intended or not. The rabbis saw the text as the reason for thanking God for their food; but the food they thus blessed had been thoroughly “investigated” before the prayer. Paul now uses the text to justify eating all foods, even those forbidden in his own Jewish heritage, since God is the ultimate source of the food—even that sold in the macellum. For that reason it can be eaten with thanksgiving. The clear implication is that nothing “contaminates” food as such along the way, meaning God simply doesn’t care about what food a person does or does not eat. Apart from Paul’s radical statements on circumcision, it is hard to imagine anything more un-Jewish in the apostle than this.

27 In a similar way Paul addresses the other kind of eating available to someone in the Greco-Roman world (apart from the temple meals, which functioned for them as “restaurants”)—invitations to someone else’s domicile. In this case there is no question as to the source of the invitation. It comes from one of the “unbelievers.” As he has already implied earlier (9:20–22), the acceptance of such invitations is perfectly legitimate (another place where he would be treading on sacred Jewish traditions); it depends on whether “you want to go.”

Because the verb “invites” is used in a semitechnical way in the papyrus invitations, some have suggested that this meal might be in either a private home or a temple. But the latter is scarcely possible—for two reasons: (1) In the following qualification (v. 28) the believer has to be informed as to the sacrificial nature of the meat one is eating; if they were at the temples, that would be known without the need to be told. (2) Despite von Soden’s suggestions to the contrary, Paul has absolutely forbidden attendance at temple meals; it is scarcely possible that he is here taking a more relaxed attitude toward something about which he felt so strongly earlier on (10:1–22). Thus it must be an invitation such as Paul himself would regularly have accepted (cf. 9:21), to dine in the home of a nonbeliever. There is no reason to assume, nor even to imagine, that Paul was thinking of festivals, and therefore that they were semireligious.

As with what one buys to eat in one’s own home, when they are eating in someone else’s home, Paul tells them (in almost identical language): “Eat whatever is put before you without raising questions of conscience.”

28–29a The two concrete examples that follow are assumed to be real conditions for believers in Corinth, and express Paul’s understanding of personal freedom in regard to adiaphora. But for Paul personal freedom is not absolute; it is always conditioned by the “rule” given at the outset (v. 24)—seeking the good of another. Thus he uses this second instance to offer a hypothetical example of a situation where the primary criterion (v. 24) would limit one’s freedom.

More difficult to determine is what kind of person Paul envisages with this “anyone.” The options are (1) the host, (2) a nonbelieving fellow guest, or (3) a fellow believer. Each of these has its strengths and weaknesses. Least likely is the possibility of a fellow believer. Although the concern for this person’s “conscience” has some affinities with an earlier use of this language (8:7), where a fellow believer is in view, nothing inherent in the present context suggests as much. Indeed, a bit later (v. 32) the possibility of offending non-Christians is explicitly mentioned, and in the next sentence (v. 33) Paul’s own actions, which are to serve as a paradigm, reflect something said a bit earlier (9:20–23) and the clear concern that non-Christians might be saved. But what is most difficult for this option, and accordingly favors one of the others, is that Paul’s hypothetical interlocutor speaks from a pagan point of view by referring to “sacrificial meat” (hierothyton) rather than the standard Jewish-Christian designation “idol meat” (eidōlothyton), which Paul had used in the earlier discussion. It is possible, of course, that a person could be reverting to their prior pagan vocabulary, but that misses the fact that this is a Pauline creation, not a report of an actual event. Since Paul himself composed it so that the person speaking uses pagan terminology, it seems unlikely that he would thereby have intended the interlocutor to be a believer. Of the other options, it is less likely that he meant the host, since he repeats the indefinite pronoun “anyone.” Had he intended the same subject as in the preceding sentence, either the demonstrative (“this one”) or no expressed subject would be more appropriate (cf. 7:36).

We may assume, then, that Paul was positing a fellow guest who was himself a nonbeliever. But that leaves us with two further questions: (1) What does Paul envision to be the motivation behind such an informant? (2) What is the relationship between the believer’s forbearance and the other person’s “conscience”? Or to put that in another way, How would a nonbeliever’s “conscience” be affected by what a believer did or did not do? Although the answer to the first question may ultimately be irrelevant to Paul’s own concern, it seems likely that he envisions the nonbeliever as trying to “help the Christian out” rather than as putting them to the test, as it were. It is not difficult to imagine how such a thing could have happened, since most Gentiles would know about Jewish scruples over such food, and since they would also think of Christianity at this stage as a basically Jewish sect.

But the second question is more difficult. Paul’s point is that one should forbear “both for the sake of the one who told you and for the sake of conscience,” which is immediately clarified in the next clause (v. 29a): “by conscience I mean the other person’s, not yours.” The clarification itself seems necessary; otherwise the preceding proviso (v. 28) not only limits freedom but allows what he has already twice disallowed—namely that food can have anything to do with Christian conscience. But how can it have anything to do with a pagan’s conscience? Probably very little at all. The clue lies in the meaning of “conscience,” which is not to be understood as “a moral arbiter” but as “moral consciousness.” The one who has pointed out the sacrificial origins of this meat to a believer has done so out of a sense of moral obligation to them, believing that Christians, like Jews, would not eat such food. So as not to offend that person, nor their moral expectations of a follower of Christ, and precisely because it is not a matter of a believer’s moral consciousness, one should forbear under these circumstances.

If this is the correct understanding of the text, then what Paul is not referring to is a fellow believer’s conscience as restricting the actions of another, as is so often assumed. The significance of this observation is that Paul does not allow any believer to make food a matter of Christian concern; he does not even do that in Rom. 14, where he does allow people their differences in such matters.

29b–30 But Paul’s present concern is not yet with the limitations of freedom imposed by the primary criterion expressed at the beginning (v. 24); he will return to that at the end (10:31–11:1). For now the concern is freedom itself. So after the qualification of eating when at table in another’s home—the only probable place where someone else could be concerned over one’s eating habits—he returns by way of that qualification to speak a final word in behalf of freedom. But the rhetoric with which he does so is so sudden and apparently non sequitur that it has created a notorious crux for later readers. A variety of solutions has been offered, none of which is fully satisfactory. The best answer seems to be found in the language “my freedom,” “being judged,” and “being denounced,” which recalls Paul’s preceding defense of his own conduct (chap. 9). Since so much of the language in the immediately following verses echoes language from the end of that “defense” (9:19–23), it seems probable that in dealing with the issue of Christian freedom in regard to adiaphora like eating marketplace food, he has felt compelled to offer a final word of defense, precisely because this was the issue on which they were judging him.

The first question is thus linked to what has just been said by a “for,” as though he were about to go on to explain further how another’s conscience, not one’s own, modifies behavior in this case. Instead, the idea of another person’s ‘conscience’ as limiting freedom on matters such as these, where God cares not in the least whether one eats or doesn’t eat, causes Paul suddenly to burst out in rhetoric against his own accusers: “For why is my freedom being judged by another’s conscience?” It is possible, of course, that the subjunctive of the NIV is what Paul intended. That is, “Why should one allow a thing like the preceding qualification to impede one’s freedom?” The problem with that view is that it receives no answer, certainly not to the second question, which seems difficult to understand in any other way than as rhetorical and apologetic.

Thus he adds, to elaborate the first question, “If I take part in the meal with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of something I thank God for?” This is the question that links this sudden outburst of rhetoric with what was said earlier (vv. 25–26), rather than later (vv. 28–29a). More literally he says, “If I partake with gratitude [referring back to v. 26 and anticipating the ‘thanksgiving prayer’ about to be mentioned], why am I being reviled for that for which I give thanks [meaning, ‘offer the thanksgiving prayer’]?” What Paul seems to be doing is referring back to the earlier qualification (v. 26), where in the Jewish home the benediction over the food was given precisely because “the earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.” If he has offered that benediction over his food (it seems less likely that it would have been offered in the nonbelievers’ home [v. 27]), then how can the Corinthians, or some of them, be judging him on this matter. He is as a Gentile to Gentiles, and as a Jew to Jews. He can either eat or not eat. But if he eats, he does so in light of the benediction alluded to at the outset (v. 26), and he is not to be condemned by anyone.

31–32 With this set of imperatives, which are joined to what precedes by an inferential “therefore,” Paul begins to bring closure to the long argument that began in 8:1, and especially to the immediate argument (10:23–11:1). He is currently addressing the question of conduct in nonessential matters, which began with the overarching principle that a believer does not seek one’s own good but that of one’s neighbor (vv. 23–24). But that must not be construed as eliminating personal freedom. Using the concrete example of marketplace food, he insists on freedom in these matters, which have nothing to do with Christian conscience. The blessing offered at one’s meal, predicated on God’s prior ownership of all things, means that no fellow believer may condemn another on this question. “Therefore,” he now concludes in light of both of the preceding scenarios (vv. 25–26 and 27–30), two imperatives must control Christian behavior on such questions. First, everything must be to the glory of God (v. 31); second, one must give no offense to anyone—Jew, nonbeliever, or fellow believer (v. 32). The first of these (v. 31) thus picks up the theme of freedom and gives it focus; the second (v. 32) picks up the theme of the legitimate limitation of freedom in terms of the effect of one’s behavior on others.

The protasis of the first imperative begins by picking up the concrete example of eating, to which is added its companion, drinking, and which is finally expanded to include all such activities, “whatever you do.” This could possibly refer simply to the preceding appeal to forbearance (v. 28); more likely it broadens the perspective to include all imaginable adiaphora. All such things must finally be “for the glory of God.” This seems in particular to pick up on the preceding theme of “thanksgiving” (v. 30), that God is to be blessed because everything is God’s and thus to God’s glory; but it also broadens the perspective. One’s whole life must be to the glory of God, not merely that part which is involved in the acknowledgment of God’s prior ownership of all things through the thanksgiving. Certainly Paul intends that this “rule” dictate the appropriateness of behavior as well. What is not, or cannot be, for the glory of the one and only God probably should be excluded from “whatever you do.”

As the next sentence makes clear, the second imperative brings the instruction back to the concerns at the beginning (vv. 23–24), although that concern is now expressed more negatively: “Do not give offense either to Jews or Greeks or the church of God.” At first blush this would seem to render ineffective the preceding instruction on personal freedom. How can one live so as not to offend someone from one of these categories? Paul’s point of course is related to behavior that is intentional. That is, with regard to “eating, drinking, etc.” one is not knowingly to pursue a path that is to the detriment of another. To “give offense,” therefore, does not so much mean to “hurt someone’s feelings” as to behave in such a way as to prevent someone else from hearing the gospel, or to alienate someone who is already a brother or sister. The categories are intentionally inclusive, echoing language from before (9:20–22). As the final two sentences imply, he is here calling on them to follow his example, the example already spelled out in his earlier “defense.” Thus Paul is urging on them the very conduct for which they were judging him: to the Jew as a Jew, to the Greek as a Greek, and to the church of God as loving a fellow believer.

Hence “freedom” does not mean that one does whatever one wishes with no regard for others; nor do the limits on freedom suggested here mean that another’s conscience dictates conduct. To the contrary, everything is for God’s glory and for the sake of the gospel, that is, for the good of all, which from Paul’s point of view means that others might be saved (v. 33). That raises both concerns above mere “rules of conduct”; indeed, here is true “freedom.” Eating and drinking are irrelevant; the one who insists on the right to eat and drink is thereby making it significant. On the other hand, because it is irrelevant, one can use such freedom to forbear when necessary for the sake of the gospel.

33 As so often happens in Pauline parenesis, he offers himself as a paradigm for the kind of conduct he is urging on others (see esp. 4:15–17). The “even as” that begins this clause very likely is intended to cover both of the preceding imperatives, but in terms of specific content it elaborates especially the preceding admonition (v. 32). In so doing the negative expression of that imperative is now reexpressed in the language with which this parenesis began (vv. 23–24). Thus, “I try to please everybody in every way.” The three categories just mentioned and the final purpose clause, “in order that they may be saved,” indicate that he means something very similar to what was said a bit earlier (9:20–22)—or perhaps that passage needs to be rethought in light of this one.

It is of some importance to note that “pleasing people” in the context of evangelism is otherwise anathema to Paul (1 Thess. 2:4; Gal. 1:10). In those passages he refers to the kind of conduct that often characterized the itinerant philosopher or religious charlatan, those who curried the favor of others in order to gain their approval. Paul’s concern is not that he himself be pleasing to them, but that his conduct be such that he may not stand in the way of their being saved. In terms of the category “church of God,” Paul’s own commentary on this text can be found in a later letter (Rom. 15:1–3), where “pleasing others” is defined as “for their good, to build them up,” which in turn appeals to the example of Christ in his suffering.

Thus Paul repeats the language with which this all began (vv. 23–24): “not seeking my own good but the good of many.” At the same time this echoes language used a bit earlier (9:22), with which the sentence now concludes: “so that they may be saved.” This is “becoming all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some.”

11:1 This final imperative has suffered from one of the more unfortunate chapter divisions in the NT. The language and argument are such that it seems clearly to conclude the preceding parenesis (10:23–33). It is not enough for Paul that he appeal to his own example. They are to follow (“imitate”) that example, in the same way that he has “imitated” Christ. On this idea in Paul one should refer to an earlier moment (4:16). The emphasis here is certainly on the example of Christ, which for Paul finds its primary focus in his sacrifice on the cross. Thus, as at the beginning of the letter (chaps. 1–4), the antidote to their behavior predicated on wisdom and knowledge is Christ crucified. It is hard to imagine a more telling way to end this long argument.

On this powerful note the long section on “idolatry” and “idol meat” comes to a conclusion. Behavior is not unimportant, but neither is it regulated by law, at least not for one who is “in Christ.” Some things are altogether incompatible with life in Christ and must be shunned (10:1–22); but other things are of no consequence whatsoever. One is free with regard to these things; but the example of Christ must be predominant, and he “pleased not himself” but willingly endured the insults of others that they might be saved (cf. Rom. 15:3).

Unfortunately, and despite this passage, the issue of personal freedom in matters that are adiaphora, as well as the limitation of freedom for the sake of others, continues to haunt many sectors of the church. Usually the battle rages over what constitutes adiaphora. Conservatives on these issues simply fail to reckon with how “liberal” Paul’s own view really is. Hence Paul himself is seldom heard for the sake of what are simply traditional regulations. On the other hand, the assertion of freedom to the hurt of others is not the biblical view either. However, and also unfortunately, in most contemporary settings the “offended” are not unbelievers or new Christians, but people who have been in the church for a long time and who tend to confuse their own personal regulations with the eternal will of God. At this point the word (not to mention the world!) has been turned upside down.

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