1. See the introduction, here .

See the introduction, .

It is in fact the earliest specific item from Paul’s letters mentioned outside the NT (1 Clem. 47:1–4 [ca. A.D. 95]).

The range of scholarly opinion is far broader and more diverse here than for any other issue in the letter (see the discussion in Hurd, 95–107). Much of how one views the whole letter is determined by one’s approach to this issue; hence its considerable importance.

For an influential study in this regard, see M. M. Mitchell, Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation: An Exegetical Investigation of the Language and Composition of 1 Corinthians (HUT 28; Tübingen, 1991). But see also (esp.) J. Munck, Paul and the Salvation of Mankind (ET, London, 1959), chap. 5, “The Church without Factions: Studies in I Corinthians 1–4.” Although Munck has perhaps slightly overstated the case, he seems to be correct in deemphasizing the role of actual parties in the church. Cf. Hurd’s assessment: “Now the perplexing fact is that the remainder of I Corinthians [chaps. 5–16] does not seem to give any information about the issues which separated these four parties about which Paul was so concerned when he began to write. I Corinthians apparently was addressed by Paul to a single, more or less unified, opposing point of view” (96). Indeed, both the great disunity among scholars as to the intensity, or lack thereof, in much of Paul’s argumentation would seem to call for a great deal more caution with regard to this kind of “all or none” approach to the various issues raised in this letter. See further the discussion in the introduction, pp. 11–13.

There can be little question that, in certain areas, some within the believing community were abusing or taking advantage of others (e.g., 6:1–11; 7:5; 8:10; 11:2–16, 20–22), but in none of these do the differences appear to be along party lines. In fact very few of the issues raised are addressed in such a way that anyone would even conjecture that there were deep differences within the community itself on these matters, the most obvious having to do with the well-to-do in relationship to the others (see below on chaps. 8–10 and 12–14). Thus, reading the rest of the letter from this perspective is a matter of our making, not Paul’s.

Cf. the analysis by N. A. Dahl, “Paul and the Church at Corinth according to 1 Corinthians 1:10–4:21,” in Christian History and Interpretation, Studies Presented to John Knox (ed. W. R. Farmer, C. F. D. Moule, and R. R. Niebuhr; Cambridge, 1967), 313–35. Dahl sees the same four issues, but states them slightly differently.

The word group appears 44 times in the first ten epistles (plus one in the Pastorals); 28 of these are in 1 Corinthians, 26 in chaps. 1–3! Of the remaining 16 occurrences, 10 are in Colossians and Ephesians, where the peculiar nature of that deviation from the gospel also dictated the language used. All of this indicates that Paul does not ordinarily think of the gospel or Christ in terms of “wisdom”; that is, the issue arose in Corinth itself and thus has dictated Paul’s own language.

Otherwise Ellis, 44–62, who first of all rejects the notion that 1 Corinthians reflects “an adversary theology, i.e., a theology incorporating ideas of his opponents that are modified and redirected against them” (46). He then argues on the basis of 2:6–16 and 12:8 that “wisdom” is basically a positive term for Paul, a gift belonging to those who are pneumatikoi (not all the Corinthian believers, but a gifted few). The background to such an understanding is then found in OT prophecy and Jewish apocalyptic.

Paul, 157.

The apologetic nature of 1:10–4:21 is the basic thesis of Dahl’s argument (see ). This position has been taken up and argued for as a literary form, but less convincingly, by J. B. Chance, “Paul’s Apology to the Corinthians,” PRS 9 (1982), 145–55. See also the favorable remarks by Hurd in his preface to the new edition of Origin.

This not only has been the traditional way of viewing things but also was the repeated suggestion of R. A. Horsley (see ).

See the introduction, .

Even if it came from Apollos by way of Alexandrian Judaism, exhibited, e.g., in Philo, this marriage of Moses and Plato was decidedly in favor of Plato and Hellenism, not Jewishness. On this whole question Munck correctly asserts: “I Cor. 1–4 shows us something taken from a Hellenistic milieu which has received the Gospel, but which introduces into the Gospel certain elements of that milieu which falsify the Gospel” (Paul, 152).

This would seem to make more sense of the “apologetic” aspect of chaps. 1–4 than to adopt the position of Dahl or Chance (see and ). Both see these chapters as being essentially preparatory for the authoritative pronouncements of the rest of the letter, but esp. of chaps. 5–6 (cf. J. H. Schütz, Paul and the Anatomy of Apostolic Authority [SNTSMS 26; Cambridge, 1975], 187–203). They also tend to deemphasize the fact that the gospel itself is at stake—as always for Paul—even when defending his apostleship. Chance, e.g., says of 1:18–25 that “in vv. 18–25 Paul defends his refusal to promote himself. . . . Paul has [thus] laid the foundation for his statements in 2:1–5 that it is because he is weak and foolish that he can serve as a spokesman for Christ” (150–51). That seems to miss the content of the paragraph and to turn the relationship of those two paragraphs on its head, not to mention sidestep the singular passion of Paul’s life—the gospel itself. Even less helpful for understanding Paul is the suggestion by D. L Gregg (“Discourse Analysis of 1 Corinthians 1:10–2:5,” LingBib 65 [1991], 37–57) that Paul is here introducing a long parenthetical section. This is to let rhetorical analysis get in the way of Paul’s own concerns; the “divisions” must be addressed, to be sure, but for Paul they are altogether secondary to what their divisiveness is doing to, and saying about, the gospel itself. That is, Paul’s response is given in the order of ultimate priorities, and for him “divisions,” though significant because of what they say theologically, are themselves secondary to what for Paul is always primary—the gospel.

On the A-B-A pattern of argumentation in this letter (here 1:18–2:5/2:6–3:4/3:5–23), see the introduction, . Cf. on 7:25–40; 8:1–10:22; 12–14. For a different understanding of the chiasmus in the present chapters, see P. F. Ellis, “Salvation through the Wisdom of the Cross,” in Sin, Salvation, and the Spirit (ed. D. Durken; Collegeville, Minn., 1979), 324–33.

P⁴⁶ 33 and a few others have the singular here, which is due to the dropping of a syllable with the same ending (σχίσμα/ματα).

For the sake of clarity and in conformity to the questions that follow, P⁴⁶ and a few others have added the negative particle μή at the beginning of the sentence, thus making certain it is read as a question—expecting a negative answer; cf. Metzger, 479.

It is not easy to decide whether Paul’s own text read as the original NIV, “I am thankful” (* B 6 1739 coppt), or as the present NIV, following the MajT, “I thank God.” Although supported only by the heart of the Egyptian tradition, the text without τῷ θεῷ is more likely original, in that the addition is easy to account for on the basis of Paul’s ordinary usage (there is no other instance of the absolute use of εὐχαριστῶ [10:30 is of a different order]). Omission here, however, could have been accidental, given the repeated Ωs in a script without breaks between words (ΕΥΧΑΡΙΣΤΩΤΩΘΕΩ); thus one’s decision can be only tentative; cf. the discussion in Metzger, 479.

On this matter see esp. J. T. Sanders, “The Transition from Opening Epistolary Thanksgiving to Body in the Letters of the Pauline Corpus,” JBL 81 (1962), 348–62; J. L. White, “Introductory Formulae in the Body of the Pauline Letter,” JBL 90 (1971), 91–97; and C. J. Bjerkelund, Parakalō: Form, Funktion und Sinn der parakalo-Sätze in den Paulinischen Briefen (Oslo, 1967).

This is the language of White, “Formulae.” However, his including it in the same category as that of Phlm. 8 or the papyrus examples he cites or refers to does not seem quite precise. In this case it fits far better with the more official documents cited by Bjerkelund (see next note).

For a full analysis of the data, as well as the Pauline usage, see Bjerkelund, Parakalō. See also K. Grayston, “A Problem of Translation: The Meaning of parakaleō, paraklēsis in the New Testament,” Scripture Bulletin 11 (1980), 27–31.

The vocative ἀδελφοί occurs more times (21) in 1 Corinthians than in any of the other letters, although proportionately it appears more often in 1 Thessalonians (14) and 2 Thessalonians (7). It occurs at a shift in the argument 17 times; 4 times in conclusions (7:24; 11:33; 14:39; 15:58). Although it ordinarily means “brothers,” it is clear from the evidence of this letter (11:2–16) and Phil. 4:1–3 that women were participants in the worship of the community and would have been included in the “brothers” being addressed. The latter passage is particularly telling, since in v. 1 Paul uses the vocative ἀδελφοί and then directly addresses two women in the very next sentence. It is therefore not pedantic, but culturally sound and biblically sensitive, for the NIV and other contemporary English versions to render this vocative “brothers and sisters.” See also .

See the suggestion of C. J. Bjerkelund Parakalō. Form, Funktion und Sinn der parakalo-Sätze in den Paulinischen Briefen (Oslo, 1967).

In much the same way as “God’s mercy,” spelled out in chaps. 1–11 in Romans, becomes the ground of the ethical appeal in 12:1. See Cranfield, ICC, 2:596.

Gk. διά with the genitive, which ordinarily reflects “means” or “agent,” here moves closer to the sense of “on the basis of.”

Gk. ἵνα. For a discussion of this idiom see Zerwick, BG, 406–8.

Gk. καί; for this usage see BDAG 1c.

Gk. σχίσματα; only here and in 11:18 and 12:25 in Paul. The context suggests it means something closer to dissensions here than schism.

The Gk. δέ is thus slightly adversative here.

Gk. νοῦς, which here means something close to “disposition” (J. Behm, TDNT 4:958) or “way of thinking” (BDAG 2). Cf. 2:16, where in contrast to the people of the world who do not have the Spirit, Paul says, “But we have the νοῦν Χριστοῦ,” which in this case means something closer to the actual thinking or plans of Christ.

Gk. γνώμη; cf. 7:25 and 40.

For this view of the dating of Galatians, see my commentary on this letter, p. 4.

Gk. καταρτίζω, “to put into proper condition; restore” (cf. Mk. 1:19, re “mending the nets”). The rendering “knit together” is from The Centenary Translation (Helen Barrett Montgomery).

Gk. ὑπὸ τῶν Χλόης, lit. “by those of Chloe.” One cannot tell whether her “household” was intended, or her “business,” although the two could be one in this case. These people could be either family, slaves, or freedmen; there is no way to tell, although slaves or freedmen is more likely, since, as Theissen, 57, points out, “members of a family would have used their father’s name, even if he were deceased”; cf. the further discussion on 92–94.

Theissen, 92–93, thinks otherwise; but his reasons are based on the (probably faulty) assumption that Rom. 16 was written to Ephesus and they are not mentioned.

This point of view was argued by Ramsay, 103–5. From time to time it has been adopted by others (e.g., Héring). Barrett, 42, is more cautious: “They had travelled between Corinth and Ephesus, but may have been based in either the one city or the other.”

Gk. ἔρις, a Pauline word in the NT (3:3; 2 Cor. 12:20; Gal. 5:20; Rom. 1:29; 13:13; Phil. 1:15; 1 Tim. 6:4; Tit. 3:9), found most often in vice lists of various kinds.

The phrase that begins v. 12, λέγω δὲ τοῦτο ὅτι, is properly translated by the NIV (cf. Barrett, Conzelmann) as “what I mean is this,” not as the RV, “Now I say this.”

We may dismiss at the outset a very old interpretation that goes back to Chrysostom and was defended by F. Field, Notes on the Translation of the New Testament (Cambridge, 1899), 169–70 (cf. Lias, 51). Based on a singular interpretation of the verb μετεσχημάτισα in 4:6 (q.v.), this interpretation suggests that in 1:12 Paul has replaced the names of the actual protagonists (members of the church in Corinth) with those of himself, Apollos, and Cephas as a legitimate fiction in order to keep from having his rebukes take a personal form. Thus in 4:6 he intended: “I have spoken the truth in the disguised form of Apollos and myself, etc.” But this is to put too much weight on a singular, and not necessary, interpretation of a single word that flies full in the face of the whole argument. After all, the plain statements in 3:5–9 about his and Apollos’s ministries are hardly “in disguise.”

Barrett, 43.

Cf. the discussion in Hurd, 97–99. Because of the information from Acts and the repeated mention of him in these chapters, it has been natural—and traditional—to take this stance. See, e.g., the considerable, sometimes speculative, reconstruction by J. H. A. Hart, “Apollos,” JTS 7 (1906), 16–28, esp. 22–28. Not all have done so, however. T. W. Manson, e.g., would dismiss Apollos altogether as having any relevance; see “St. Paul in Ephesus: (3) The Corinthian Correspondence,” BJRL 26 (1941), 101–20 (repr. in Studies in the Gospels and Epistles [Manchester, 1962], 190–209).

The Gk. λόγιος can mean either “educated” or “eloquent.” The earlier versions all preferred “eloquent,” probably on the basis of their understanding of 1 Corinthians. This may very well be right, but certainty is not available.

Paul usually refers to him by his Aramaic name Κηφᾶς (cf. 3:22; 9:5; 15:5; Gal. 1:18; 2:9, 11, 14), although Gal. 2:7–8 plainly shows that for him the Greek and Aramaic are interchangeable, as they probably were in all the churches.

For the debate on this question see O. Cullmann, Peter (Philadelphia, 1953), 53–54 (esp. his n. 55).

On the question of how much about the apostles might have been known in the early churches, see J. Jervell, “The Problem of Traditions in Acts,” in Luke and the People of God (ET, Minneapolis, 1972), 19–39.

F. C. Baur envisioned such divisions, as did many who followed him. See his Paul (ET, London, 1873), 268–320. Baur condensed the four into two: a Paul-Apollos party opposed by a Judaizing Peter-Christ party. The influence of a Judaizing group under Peter has been a commonly held position since. For more recent advocacy see Manson, “Corinthian Correspondence”; C. K. Barrett, “Cephas and Corinth,” in Abraham unser Vater, Festschrift für Otto Michel (Leiden, 1963), 1–12; and P. Vielhauer, “Paulus und die Kephaspartei in Korinth,” NTS 21 (1974–75), 341–52. Common to these latter three is the view that the “Peter-party” represents the greater threat to the community, and that there are veiled allusions to him in the silence in 3:1–9 and 4:6, and in the person who was laying another foundation in 3:11. See the discussion on these verses for a refutation of this view (cf. the excursus in Fascher, 34–37).

It is not by accident, therefore, that many of the scholars who have advocated this position start their investigation with 2 Corinthians 10–13. See, e.g., W. L. Knox, Paul and the Church of Jerusalem (Cambridge, 1939), 311, 320–22; and H. J. Schoeps, Paul (ET, Philadelphia, 1961), 78–82. See further the disussion by Hurd, 99–101.

Cf. the judgment of Dahl (“Paul,” 315), who after reviewing various scholarly options concludes: “There is a wide . . . agreement that in I Corinthians Paul is not opposing Judaizers.”

Bachmann, 67, believes that Peter had not been in Corinth, but that some converts of his from the East had moved to Corinth. This possibility, of course, cannot be ruled out.

M. E. Goulder tried (but without apparent success) to resurrect the tired thesis of F. C. Baur that the only real issue was between Paul and Peter, and that the appearance of “Apollos” is something of a covert attack on a Jewish Christian element who had come to Corinth to subvert Paul’s gospel (see “Sophia in 1 Corinthians,” NTS 37 [1991], 516–34).

See the summary in Allo, 9–10, and his Excursus 4:80–87; cf. the discussion in Hurd, 101–6. For a more recent survey, esp. of German scholarship, see Fascher, 90–92.

Hurd tends to favor this position, esp. for reason 5.

That is, “Each of you says, ‘I am of Paul, etc.,’ but I am of Christ.” See, e.g., K. Lake, The Earlier Epistles of Paul: Their Motive and Origin (2nd ed., London, 1914), 127.

See the large number of options listed by Allo, 80–87. Usually it has been argued that this is a group from James, and that the Peter-party would therefore be the moderates. Recent advocates include S. G. F. Brandon, The Fall of Jerusalem and the Christian Church (London, 1957), 140; and W. O. Fitch, “Paul, Apollos, Cephas, Christ,” Theology 74 (1971), 18–24.

A view first presented by W. Lütgert (Freiheitspredigt und Schwarmgeister in Korinth [Gütersloh, 1908]). It has been vigorously advocated in recent years by Schmithals in his Gnosticism in Corinth.

See esp. Conzelmann’s Excursus, 33–34. Cf. Moffatt, 10, and Murphy-O’Connor, 11–12, among others.

Despite the attractiveness of Lake’s translation ( above), it has against it the clear listing intended by the μέν, δέ, δέ, δέ, with no signal that there is a break with the fourth member, not to mention that the first question in v. 13 seems to suppose that the fourth slogan is one of theirs (see below).

The statement in 2 Cor. 10:7, “If anyone is confident that he belongs to Christ,” is often seen as further evidence for this party and its continuing existence as the real trouble in the church; but that seems to miss the real point of the 2 Corinthians passage. There some outsiders (“super-apostles”) are claiming to be Christ’s servants (11:23), and Paul is simply answering their claim by arguing that he, too, belongs to Christ. Cf. Dahl, “Paul,” 323, and V. P. Furnish, II Corinthians (AB 32A; Garden City, N.Y., 1984), 476.

Otherwise Conzelmann, 34, who argues that one cannot “dismiss the group question as being merely a matter of harmless squabbles. The energy Paul expends upon it is too great for that.” However, I do not argue that these are “harmless squabbles.” As noted above (p. 50), they reflect a serious misunderstanding of the gospel itself, as well as of the church and its leaders; hence the energy expended, since for Paul everything else is subordinate to the gospel.

Paul, 150.

Cf. the alternatives to this solution proposed by Dahl (“Paul,” 322–25) and Theissen, 99–110. Dahl suggests that the division arose over whether or not to write to Paul, since, as some asserted (4:18), he had promised to return but did not. They were arguing, therefore, that they should contact one of their other teachers. Theissen suggests that the division is really between some well-to-do converts, who had “entertained” the various leaders while they were in Corinth and who, because of social status, exercised considerable influence on others who were of lower classes.

Cf. 4:15 where their “countless guides” would include the Corinthians themselves, who are trying to continue Paul’s work, each in his own way (cf. Munck, Paul, 152).

This is a frequent device in 1 Corinthians. See, e.g., 4:7; 6:1–5; 10:22; 14:36; etc.

R. W. Funk, Language, Hermeneutic, and Word of God (New York, 1966), 161–62, has suggested that the three questions and the rest of 1:15–4:21 are a form of chiasm, being responded to in reverse order: 1:14–16 responds to the third question; 1:18–2:16 to the second; 3:1–4:21 to the third. This seems doubtful, esp. since 1:18–2:16 scarcely responds to the question, “Was Paul crucified for you?”

A few translations so render it; “Christ has been divided into groups” (GNB); “And so, in effect, you have broken Christ into many pieces” (LB); “You have rent the Christ in pieces!” (TCNT).

The earliest MS of 1 Corinthians (P⁴⁶) has so understood it, by adding the negative μή. See above.

See, among others, O. Cullmann, Baptism in the New Testament (ET, London, 1950), who rather boldly asserts: “in I Cor. 1.13 . . . Baptism is clearly conceived as participation in the Cross of Christ. . . . Here the two expressions ‘you were baptised’ and ‘another was crucified for you’ are treated as synonymous” (15; italics mine). This seems to miss Paul’s point, and to exceed the evidence considerably. Not only does Paul treat the two questions separately (baptism, vv. 14–16; the preaching of the cross, vv. 17–25), but at the end (v. 17) he deliberately separates them as two distinct events. J. D. G. Dunn rightly assesses: “While the association of the two questions in v. 13 is suggestive, any link between the event of the cross and that of baptism must be based on firmer ground than 1.13 affords” (Baptism in the Holy Spirit [London, 1970], 118).

See the discussion in Dunn, Baptism, 117.

It seems altogether likely, esp. on the basis of Acts 2:38; 8:16; 10:48 (perhaps; see ); and 19:5 (cf. Rom. 6:3), that the early church baptized only in the name of Jesus, rather than in the Trinitarian formula of Matt. 28:19. This text could add to that evidence; however, one needs to be cautious here, since the concern is so obviously of another kind that one cannot be sure that it adequately reflects the precise formula for Christian baptism. It at least included the name of the Lord Jesus.

For this use of “I thank God,” see also 14:18.

This is further strengthened by the mention of Stephanas in v. 16, since Paul explicitly refers to him and his household as the “first converts in Achaia” (16:15).

R. G. Fellows has raised the interesting, but ultimately unprovable, hypothesis that Crispus is the Latin form of the name of Sosthenes, Paul’s co-author mentioned in v. 1 (“Renaming in Paul’s Churches: The Case of Crispus-Sosthenes Revisited,” TynB 56 [2005], 111–30). Evidence for this view is based on these two names appearing for the Corinthian synagogue leader mentioned in Acts 18:8 and 17, which many think reflects Luke’s alternating between the Greek and Latin versions of his name.

This is the standard view, based on the fact that the collection that was anticipated by Paul’s third visit to Corinth (2 Cor. 8–9) had now been received from Achaia (Rom. 15:26). On the Roman destination of chap. 16, see H. Gamble, The Textual History of the Letter to the Romans (Grand Rapids, 1977).

On this whole question and its significance for various issues in this letter, see Theissen, 69–119, who argues convincingly that Crispus and Stephanas were also from the upper classes.

Bruce, 34, notes the suggestion that he might be identified with the God-fearer Titius Justus of Acts 18:7, whose house was next to the synagogue and the place where the church gathered after it had been excluded from the synagogue. Thus his full Roman name would have been Gaius Titius Justus. This is intriguing and plausible, in light of the fact that he was almost certainly one of the early converts in the city.

Although it is quite beside Paul’s point, a great amount of ink has been spilt over Paul’s use of οἶκος here (cf. 16:15, where οἰκία is used), whether this baptism also included infants and small children. Much of the more recent debate has centered on whether the terms οἶκος/οἰκία (both translated “household” in the NIV) in other sources have normally included infants. A. Strobel (“Der Begriff des ‘Hauses’ im griechischen und römischen Privatrecht,” ZNW 56 [1965], 91–100) has shown that οἰκία would be a broader term that would often include slaves, while οἶκος was used in a narrower sense for those within a family who possessed legal rights, thus excluding slaves and usually minor children. But even he admits that this evidence is inconclusive; and Theissen, 83–87, has pointed out that the terms are more interchangeable than Strobel allows. In sum, it is the nearly universal judgment of NT scholarship that a biblical case for infant baptism cannot be decided on the basis of these “house-formulae.” This judgment comes from scholars on both sides of the issue. See, e.g., G. Delling, “Zur Taufe von ‘Häusern’ im Urchristentum,” NovT 7 (1965), 285–311, who thus bases the practice on the sole efficacy of the grace of God as it is given in Christ. The notable exception is J. Jeremias, Infant Baptism in the First Four Centuries (ET, London, 1960), and The Origins of Infant Baptism: A Further Study in Reply to Kurt Aland (ET, Naperville, Ill., 1962). Aland’s study was entitled Did the Early Church Baptize Infants? (ET, Philadelphia, 1963). On this whole question, both historically and biblically, see chap. 6 in G. R. Beasley-Murray, Baptism in the New Testament (London, 1963).

Gk. οἶδα, “know,” in the sense of “recall”; cf. 16:15.

Gk. ἀπέστειλεν, the verb form of the noun ἀπόστολος.

Cf. the similar conclusion in Dunn, Baptism, 118–20; see also Beasley-Murray, Baptism, 177–81.

See, e.g., Lietzmann, 9.

Gk. ἐν σοφίᾳ λόγου, although one can be rather certain that it does not mean, as the ESV has it, “words of eloquent wisdom,” which seems to have it exactly backward.

This also unfortunately makes it fair game for any number of scholarly speculations as to the internal issues among the believers themselves, as well as the nature and degree of the friction between any of the “factions” within the church and Paul himself.

Scholarship over several decades in the twentieth century has been so enamored with sophia as content (hypostatic Wisdom as the way of salvation) that it has generally neglected sophia as speech and rhetoric. For a corrective, see Horsley, “Wisdom,” although his own enthusiasm for Philonic parallels causes him to reach some debatable conclusions about the Corinthians’ own role in this matter. Cf. R. Scroggs, “Paul: ΣΟΦΟΣ ΚΑΙ ΠΝΕΥΜΑΤΙΚΟΣ,” NTS 14 (1967/68), 36.

A concern to establish his message as not something merely human, i.e., merely a matter of rhetoric or speech, had already exercised Paul considerably in Thessalonica (see 1 Thess. 1:5; 2:3–6, 13). But there are clear differences between the concern in 1 Thessalonians and the one expressed here. There logos is seen positively, as a part of the whole of the witness. Here it is totally pejorative.

Traditionally it was assumed that it reflects the Greek philosophical or sophist tradition. The most comprehensive recent advocacy of this position can be found in Munck (Paul, 148–54); it is the position basically adopted in this commentary. Some who see the background as Greek argue for a hypostatic (personal) understanding of sophia. Thus they see the Corinthians as having equated Sophia with the so-called heavenly redeemer of Gnosticism (see esp. Wilckens, 68–76). Others have viewed the emphasis on wisdom as belonging to the Jewish wisdom tradition, either the personified wisdom of Proverbs (e.g., 8:1–9:6) and Sirach (e.g., 1:4, 9) or its Hellenized form in Philo of Alexandria (see Pearson, 27–39; Horsley, “Wisdom” and “Marriage”; and Davis [see ]). But the problems with these views are twofold: (1) There does not seem to be any viable evidence that the Corinthians had a personalized view of wisdom; indeed, the evidence goes in the other direction (see comm. on 1:24 and 30); (2) the background seems unlikely to be Jewish, since Paul explicitly says that the Jews demand signs and it is the Greeks who seek for wisdom. Davis, 189 n. 26, calls this objection “misguided.” But to do so he must dismiss Paul’s explicit statement in favor of a highly speculative midrashic analysis of the text. Whether rhetorical or not, Paul’s clear statement is that Greeks, not Jews, pursue wisdom. Some of course (e.g., Ellis, 45–62) reject wisdom as a Corinthian concern and see it as Paul’s own point of view, which is then argued for as having a Jewish background. But the context of the whole argument seems to speak too strongly against this option. Even Paul’s affirmations of wisdom in 2:6–16 seem to have been dictated by the position of the church. Elsewhere he simply does not reflect this emphasis or understanding. Cf. the statistics on .

The 1978 NIV rendered this similar phrase in 2:1 with the considerably misleading “superior wisdom.” “Superior” was not Paul’s concern; rather it was relying on “wisdom” at all that concerned him, esp. since the word obviously carried for them a much different (higher?) value than it did for Paul.

This is the first occurrence of the terms “cross” and “crucified” in the Pauline corpus. They do not occur in Paul as often as one might be led to think (“cross” ten times; “crucify” eight). Most of these are in conflict settings. Otherwise Paul tends to speak of Christ’s having “died” for us.

The NIV adds the words “of its power,” on the basis of the context in v. 18. This is almost certainly the correct understanding of the usage, which also might be translated “rendered ineffective” or “invalidated.”

The use of this language throughout the commentary is intended to leave open-ended the issue of “who” and “how many” might have been involved in the attitudes Paul is here taking on—or, more precisely, we should refer to the Corinthians who were taking Paul on.

This passage has suffered perhaps as much as any other in the NT from the insertion of the otherwise helpful numbers. Everything in Paul’s argument makes it clear that our 2:1–5 is the third illustration of “God’s folly”—the gospel itself, the believers whom God has chosen, and the apostle of “weakness”—are all intended to shatter the Corinthians’ present enamorment with sophia. The headings in the present NIV, which begin the next phase of the argument at 2:6, have finally got this right, while the headings in the ESV (1:18; 2:1, 6) can only be judged as thoroughly misleading.

Some have detected a midrashic pattern to this section, similar to some patterns found in Qumran and Philo. See W. Wuellner, “Haggadic Homily Genre in I Corinthians 1–3,” JBL 89 (1970), 199–204; Ellis, 213–20; J. I. H. MacDonald, Kerygma and Didache: The Articulation and Structure of the Earliest Christian Message (Cambridge, 1980), 37–68; V. P. Branick, “Source and Redaction Analysis of 1 Corinthians 1–3,” JBL 101 (1982), 251–69; and Davis, 67–70. While this may be helpful in seeing the milieu of Paul’s own basically Jewish thought patterns, it says little about the Corinthians themselves, as Davis, e.g., proposes. Furthermore, the advocates of this theory go considerably beyond the evidence when they also suggest that the homily may have already existed and that Paul is here adapting it (Ellis) or that “the exegesis of this homily can no longer be made with certainty in reference to the conditions in the church in Corinth” (Branick, 267). Since it is so thoroughly Pauline in its present “adaptation,” it is nearly irrelevant to suggest that it may have had prior existence; and to argue that it may not fit the present context seems both to miss the true nature of the problem in Corinth and to plead for irrationality in exegesis. If Paul did not intend all this to speak directly to the Corinthians, then we must argue that authors are nonintentional, and the whole question of the meaning of an author’s words becomes moot.

On a different tack, K. Bailey has found intricate poetic patterns in 1:17–2:2, consisting of a 13-part chiasm, with v. 23 as the middle member (“Recovering the Poetic Structure of I Cor. i 17–ii 2: A Study in Text and Commentary,” NovT 17 [1975], 265–96; now in Paul through Mediterranean Eyes, 67–101). There can be little question, it would seem, that much of Paul’s argumentation takes on the patterns of semitic parallelism; but this is a reflection of how his mind works. The “chiasm” that Bailey has discovered is less than convincing, since he must omit what doesn’t fit (in this case, vv. 27–28) and seems to miss the obvious structures of Paul’s own argumentation (a section of poetry that has 1:17 and 2:2 as its beginning and ending makes little sense of the flow of Paul’s thought, nor of his conjunctions and particles).

The Latin tradition omits ἡμῖν, probably a translational variant.

Gk. γραμματεύς, usually rendered “scribe” in the KJV. Most often in the NT (as here) it is a technical term referring to the Jewish expert in the law, which made the rendering “scholar” in the original NIV considerably misleading, since the point of Paul’s rhetoric is to include the “learned” of both Gentile and Jew.

P¹¹ (7th c.) and the later MajT add τούτου (“this”) to conform the text to the more common Pauline usage; cf. the discussion in Metzger, 479–80.

The MajT reads “Greeks” here, an assimilation to vv. 22 and 24. Here is clear evidence that these two terms are nearly synonymous, and thus interchangeable, for Paul.

Gk. σῳζομένοις; cf. v. 21. Although not frequent in this letter (3:15; 5:5; 7:16; 9:22; 10:33; 15:2), this is probably the most comprehensive word in Paul’s vocabulary for God’s redemptive event. His use of the verb has its roots in the OT; see G. Föhrer, TDNT 7:970–80. The NIV properly captures the nuance of the present tense for both verbs. For Paul, salvation, begun through faith in Christ and the coming of the Spirit—as certain as it is for him—is nonetheless always “a work in progress.”

Gk. ἀπολλυμένοις; cf. 8:11; 10:9–10; 15:18. The verb means to experience eternal loss.

This essentially eschatological framework, in which salvation and judgment are both “already” and “not yet,” is absolutely crucial to any proper understanding of Paul. See, e.g., H. Ridderbos, Paul: An Outline of His Theology (ET, Grand Rapids, 1975), 39: “one can speak of a growing consensus insofar that scholars are more and more finding the point of departure for an adequate approach to the whole in the redemptive-historical, eschatological character of Paul’s proclamation” (italics his). It is thoroughgoing in this letter, touching almost every part. See the introduction, .

This is one of the sure evidences that the problem from Paul’s perspective is soteriological, not christological (pace Wilckens). Thus the contrast is stated this way, not so as to avoid a misunderstanding of what wisdom means for him (as Wilckens and Schütz, Paul, 196 would have it), but precisely because the Corinthians are turning the gospel into a form of wisdom in which the death of Christ is being emptied of its power.

The absolute use of γέγραπται in Paul is always a reference to the OT Scriptures. See E. E. Ellis, Paul’s Use of the Old Testament (Edinburgh, 1957), 22–25. Those who see this section as midrash consider this to be the text for the sermon. See Wuellner, “Haggadic Homily,” 201; and Ellis, 213. However, since all of this flows out of the contrasts set up in v. 17, it seems far more likely that in this case the text has been determined by the context, not the other way around.

For an esp. helpful overview/analysis of these six citations (here; 1:31; 2:9; 2:16; 3:19; 3:20), see R. B. Hays, “The Conversion of the Imagination: Scripture and Eschatology in 1 Corinthians,” NTS 45 (1999), 391–412, esp. 402–9.

Although the citation is basically from the LXX, Paul has altered the final word from κρύψω (“I will hide”) to ἀθετήσω, perhaps as has often been suggested, on the basis of Ps. 33:10 (“The Lord . . . thwarts the purposes of the people”). In any case, the word “hide” is probably a Hebrew idiom that in the Isaiah passage is correctly rendered by the NIV “will vanish.” Thus, as Davis, 71–72, has rightly pointed out, it should here carry its basic meaning of “set aside,” rather than “thwart” or “frustrate.”

Some have argued that this verse, too, is a quotation from Isaiah and therefore see Paul here, along with the allusions to Jer. 9:23–24 in vv. 26–31, using a florilegium (a prior collection of “testimonies” to Christ that the early church had gathered from various places in the OT). See H. St. John Thackeray, The Septuagint and Jewish Worship (London, 1921), 95–100; L. Cerfaux, “Vestiges d’un florilège dans I Cor. 1.18–3.24?” RHE 27 (1931), 521–34; and E. Peterson, “1 Korinther 1,18f. und die Thematic des jüdischen Busstages,” Bib 32 (1951), 97–103. Peterson advanced the argument in particular as a result of the Qumran discoveries (see esp. 4QFlor). This is a matter still very much up for grabs in NT scholarship. Two things may be said about it here: (1) One can neither prove nor disprove that Paul had such a collection available to him. (2) But in any case v. 20 is not a quotation from Isaiah. At best the questions are allusions; more likely they are a “free formulation on Paul’s part in reminiscence of passages from Isaiah” (Conzelmann, 42).

See, e.g., Conzelmann, 43 n. 32, who thinks that the suggestion is “too subtle.”

In ordinary Greek vocabulary it refers to a civil officer, e.g., the “town-clerk” of Acts 19:35. See BDAG 2a; cf. Lightfoot, 159.

Otherwise Davis, 73 (following R. G. Hamerton-Kelly, Pre-Existence, Wisdom, and the Son of Man [Cambridge, 1973], 119), who argues that all three questions assume a Jewish milieu. Given the argument that follows, one would need particularly strong evidence for such a view, evidence that is not forthcoming.

The alternative to this interpretation, favored, e.g., by Godet and Wilckens, is to see the first as the general term, including both Jew and Greek, while the latter two narrow the focus. This is quite possible. What seems beyond question is that Paul himself was thinking in these terms, and thereby anticipating the rest of the argument.

Gk. συζητητής; found only here and in Ignatius, Eph. 18:1, in all of Greek literature.

Gk. τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου. This is clearly eschatological language, reflecting the terms “this age” and “the coming age” in rabbinic and apocalyptic Judaism. For Paul, therefore, it becomes an ethical/moral term. Since in Christ God has ushered in the future, which will be consummated at the Parousia, the present age has been judged, and therefore condemned, by God. All who live under its aegis and share in its point of view likewise live under the judgment of God and are passing away. Hence, they belong to this age, as over against the new age that God is bringing in.

Cf. Conzelmann, 43.

Gk. ἐμώρανεν; cf. the discussion by G. Bertram, TDNT 4:845–47.

In this instance Paul uses τοῦ κόσμου. This is a clear indication that the two terms αἴων (“age”) and κόσμος (“world”) had come to merge in his own thinking. Both have become eschatological terms, conditioned by God’s ultimate event in Christ, his cross and resurrection. Both the κόσμος, the world order that has been under the domination of Satan, and the present (fallen) age have been judged by God in Christ and are thus in the process of passing away (see esp. 7:29–31). On this term see J. Guhrt, NIDNTT 1:521–26, and H. Sasse, TDNT 3:868–95.

Conzelmann, 43.

Note Godet’s nice touch: “He has, as it were, befooled wisdom” (94).

The γάρ that connects this sentence to v. 20 is what makes our choice as to the meaning of v. 20 seem certain. This conjunction implies that v. 21 explains the final question of v. 20. Had that final question been the beginning of a debate with the hypothetical “wise ones,” one would have expected a different syntax here (a δέ or no particle at all).

The Greek literally reads “through wisdom.” Some have understood this to refer to something like a “system of sophia,” and therefore to a kind of quasi-gnostic understanding of the world. Thus σοφία here is understood more in terms of content than mode or way of viewing things. But the latter understanding is to be preferred (hence the NIV: “through its wisdom”), since the phrase διὰ τῆς σοφίας stands in contrast in this sentence to the διὰ τῆς μωρίας τοῦ κηρύγματος in the following, companion clause.

Gk. ἔγνω, probably an inceptive aorist.

At this point Paul’s Jewish understanding of “knowing God” comes to the fore (cf. E. D. Schmitz, NIDNTT 2:395–97). The phrase in the next clause, “to save those who believe,” is therefore the proper commentary on this one.

Some take the phrase ἐν τῇ σοφίᾳ τοῦ θεοῦ to be a quasi-instrumental, making it mean “The world did not know God by means of the wisdom of God displayed in the created order” (e.g., Kümmel, Héring). But that not only puts considerable strain on the context, it seems to miss the significance of the word order. This phrase stands first here and is something of an absolute usage (i.e., it does not modify “the world did not know,” but an understood “God so arranged things in his own wisdom that the world did not know”). Cf. A. J. M. Wedderburn, “ἐν τῇ σοφίᾳ τοῦ θεοῦ—1 Kor 1.21,” ZNW 64 (1973), 132–34, who, following Moule, 79, calls this usage circumstantial.

Gk. εὐδόκησεν, a word that in Paul implies strong volition, as well as taking pleasure in. See BDAG; G. Schrenk, TDNT 2:740–42.

Ruef, 13, suggests that it refers to both. But cf. G. Friedrich (TDNT 3:714–17), who notes: “It is worth considering whether the reference in 1 C. 1:21 might not be to the act, namely, that it pleased God through something foolish, i.e., human preaching, to save men. But the context . . . favours the sense of content in v. 21.” Cf. 15:14.

As elsewhere, this is predicated on the view that Galatians was written after 1 Corinthians, but before Romans. See the “Author’s Preface,” xvii; cf. my Galatians: Pentecostal Commentary (Blandford Forum, 2007), 4–5. The expression in 2 Thess. 2:10, “to be saved . . . through belief in the truth,” puts the emphasis more on believing the gospel to be true—in contrast to those in vv. 8–12 who “believe the lie”—than on personal trust in Christ.

Cf. Barrett: “It implies a refusal to take God on trust; he must present his credentials in the form of visible and identifiable acts in which his claim upon man . . . [is] validated” (54); and Conzelmann: “In this way they set themselves up as an authority that can pass judgment upon God. . . . They expect God to submit himself to their criteria” (47).

See Matt. 12:38–39; Mark 8:11; Luke 11:16; John 6:30.

It is this clear statement of Paul’s that makes it so difficult to root the use of wisdom in this passage in the Jewish wisdom tradition as many do (see ). The fact that Paul identifies it as a Greek characteristic and then uses all his rhetorical energy against “the wisdom of this world,” which the Greeks seek, seems to demand a Hellenistic derivation of the Corinthian position; unless, of course, it is to be found, as Horsley argues, in Hellenistic Judaism, which Paul perceived to be more Greek than Jewish. But that, too, seems doubtful.

History 4.77 (Loeb).

This is the first appearance of a first person plural verb in the letter. Cf. the comments on 1:1 and 2:6. One should note how natural it is for Paul to slip into this usage; note also that it tends to happen in such places as this, where Paul would be concerned to imply that such preaching is not unique to himself. See 15:10–11.

Gk. perfect, ἐσταυρωμένον. Perhaps the perfect reflects, as W. C. Robinson, Jr. (“Word and Power,” in Soli Deo Gloria: Essays for W. C. Robinson [ed. J. M. Richards; Richmond, 1968], 71) and Ellis (74) believe, the possibility that for Paul the exalted Lord “in his exaltation, remains the crucified one” (Ellis, 73). On the other hand, it is an adjective here (cf. 2:2) and one wonders what other form the adjective might have taken.

On this whole subject, including both the actual historical data on crucifixion in the Roman world and the meaning of Jesus’ crucifixion for both Christian and pagan, see M. Hengel, Crucifixion (ET, Philadelphia, 1977).

Cf. Tacitus (Annals 15.44): “Christus, the founder of the name [Christian], had undergone the death penalty in the reign of Tiberius, by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate” (Loeb).

The Greek word translated “stumbling block” is σκάνδαλον, from which we derive our word “scandal.” “Scandal” is in fact closer to the sense than “stumbling block,” since the word does not so much mean something that one is tripped up by as something that offends to the point of arousing opposition (see BDAG).

See m. Sanh. 6.4: “All that have been stoned must be hanged. But the Sages say: None is hanged save the blasphemer and idolater” (Danby).

One should perhaps not make too much of it, but the subtle shift of terms from “Greeks” to “Gentiles” in this clause seems noteworthy. While under most of this discussion the two terms could be interchangeable, it was esp. the “Greek” who sought after wisdom. On the other hand, not only the Greek, but the Roman in particular, would find a crucified messiah utter nonsense.

This is the language of Tacitus (see above). Cf. the younger Pliny: “a perverse, extravagant superstition” (Ep. 10.96.8).

Crucifixion, 1.

This oft-repeated suggestion needs to be laid to rest. In fact, such an idea would be at odds with Paul’s concern here. This is not a christological statement, such as one finds in Col. 2:2–3, for example. Rather, it is a soteriological statement, just as is v. 30 (q.v.). After all, it begins, “Christ the power of God,” in direct response to the quest of the Jews in vv. 22–23. One may as well argue that a personified Dynamis Christology lies behind the Corinthian folly. For a full disclaimer as to even a remote possibility that Paul had anything that might possibly border on a “wisdom Christology,” see now “Appendix A” in my Pauline Christology (Peabody, Mass., 2007), 595–630.

B syr vg Origen, followed by the later MajT, read a καί here; it is missing in the majority of early sources East and West. Its addition is easily accounted for, for the same reasons that the NIV translates with an “and”; cf. Metzger, 480.

This, of course, presents the later reader with a considerable measure of tension with some later moments in the letter, esp. chaps. 8–10, where the issue seems clearly to be a view from above, where some of the wealthy are abusing the less so in the matter of (apparently rather sumptuous) meals.

D F G have replaced the γάρ with an οὖν, but as Barrett, 56, correctly points out, this inverts the argument. The paragraphing in the NIV effects this proper transition without translating the γάρ.

Gk. βλέπετε, a mild imperative that functions here in a way similar to a parent scolding a child covered with dirt, “look at you!” Barrett, 56, follows Schlatter here in seeing this as an indicative. The imperative is to be preferred, as elsewhere in this letter (8:9; 10:18; 16:10).

This passage, of course, stands in considerable tension with what is said later in our chap. 8, where the focus is clearly on the more wealthy abusing the less so in the matter of the Lord’s Table—which means that the “not many of you” is quite important, esp. because the wealthy being judged later in the letter are here apparently being deliberately included in the present argument, and perhaps are even the major focus of it. This is also the passage of which Lady Huntingdon was reported to have said, “Saved by an M; Paul did not say not ‘any’ of you but not ‘many’ of you.”

Gk. κλῆσις, in form a verbal noun, thus emphasizing the act more than the acquired status resulting from it.

Despite BDAG 2 there is no evidence that it ever referred to vocation or station in life. See Bartchy, 136 n. 482.

Gk. κατὰ σάρκα; for the use of σάρξ in Paul see E. Schweizer, TDNT 7:125–38; for a more popular treatment see W. Barclay, Flesh and Spirit (Nashville, 1962), 16–22.

But cf. the addition to the prayer of Hannah (1 Sam. 2:10) in the LXX, which has φρόνιμοι and δύνατοι for the σοφοί and ἰσχυροί of Jeremiah.

Cf. Acts 25:5; Jos. War 1.242; Philo, Mos. 1.49. Cf. D. Sänger, “Die dynatoi in 1 Kor 1:26,” ZNW 76 (1985), 285–91.

It was populated chiefly by freedmen from Italy. See the introduction, .

Paul, 162–63 n. 2: “While we can take it without further evidence, that the sophists are σοφοί, there are various examples of their having parents or ancestors who are δύνατοι and εὐγενεῖς.” The examples that follow are both numerous and convincing, and seem to disallow that the terms are merely sociological, as Theissen, 70–71, argues. Both Pearson, 40, and Horsley, “Pneumatikos,” 282–83, have argued that Philo also uses such terminology for those advanced in wisdom (cf. the enthusiastic endorsement by Davis, 191 n. 42, who asserts that their examples “show the true provenance of this terminology”). But in fact none of their examples brings this set, nor anything quite like it, together. Nor does Philo use this language in such a way as to build confidence that he is the source of a Corinthian usage.

Quoted by Origen in Contra Celsum 3.44 (trans. H. Chadwick; Cambridge, 1965), 158. Origen rightly goes on to respond, on the basis of 1 Cor. 1:26, that this is not the whole picture, but in so doing he quite neglects Paul’s own point.

W. Wuellner, “The Sociological Implications of I Corinthians 1:26–28 Reconsidered,” StudEv 6 (TU 112; Berlin, 1973), 672. Unfortunately Wuellner’s position is predicated primarily on grammatical grounds, which in this case are shaky at best, and lacks the more solid approach of sociology. Cf. also K. Schreiner, “Zur biblischen Legitimation des Adels: Auslegungsgeschichte zu 1. Kor. 1,26–29,” ZKG 85 (1975), 317–57.

See esp. E. A. Judge, The Social Patterns of Christian Groups in the First Century (London, 1960), 49–61, and G. Theissen, Social Setting, chaps. 2–4. The more moot point in these analyses is the contention that although the majority were from the lower strata, they were by and large influenced by the dominant minority who were from the upper classes. Theissen, in fact, makes this his general thesis about the church in Corinth, and sees 1 Corinthians, therefore, as addressed primarily to this upper-class minority, who by their own frictions are responsible for dividing the church. Thus he sees Paul’s statement in 4:10 as a reflection of sober reality, that they were indeed “wise, strong, and honored.” He must therefore treat v. 26 as not addressing the recipients directly; rather it is intended to remind them of how the majority are. But this seems to turn the two passages upside down. The argument in 4:8–11 is filled with so much irony that it is difficult to take it for sober reality; on the other hand, the present passage addresses the church directly, and says “Look at your calling, brothers and sisters.” This is the sober reality. Otherwise, the whole force of the argument is lost. Rhetoric, after all, derives its force from the agreement it assumes and to which it refers.

Gk. ἐξελέξατο, the word for election. The emphasis here is not on election as such, but on the sovereignty of God who elects as he wills, and whom he wills.

In each case in vv. 27–28 the “foolish, weak, and lowly” are neuter plural, while the first contrasting noun, “the wise,” is masculine. and the others are neuter. This presents an unusual sentence in the Greek, but it is understandable nonetheless. The older commentators (e.g., Lightfoot, Godet) tended to make too much of these gender differences. The best solution is that Paul is here generalizing. Not only did God choose the “foolish” (people scorned by the Corinthians?), but in all of God’s ways what is “chosen” is that (or “those”) which (or “whom”) the world deems as foolish (including the cross). Cf. Barrett, 58, who translates: “what the world counts foolish.” This seems to catch Paul’s point.

Gk. ἀγενῆ, the opposite of εὐγενεῖς, but most often meaning not “low born,” but simply “insignificant” or “base.”

Cf. H. C. Kee, “The Linguistic Background of ‘Shame’ in the New Testament,” in On Language, Culture, and Religion: In Honor of Eugene A. Nida (ed. M. Black and W. A. Smalley; The Hague, 1974), 133–47.

This term in particular must weigh heavily in one’s understanding of the sociological dimensions of the church discussed above in v. 26. This is a deliberate word choice by Paul to elaborate further the meaning of “not well-born.” Not only are such people “poorly related,” but they are also scorned by those who are. It makes little sense in this context if this does not reflect the lower-class status of the majority.

Gk. καταργέω.

This expression is used in Judaism to refer to the doctrine of creation ex nihilo (out of nothing; cf. 2 Macc. 7:28; Philo, spec.leg. 4.187) and of conversion as the new creation (Jos. et As. 8.15). But as Conzelmann notes (51 n. 23), nothing like this is in Paul’s mind, since “the things that are” belong “to the negative side.”

See 2:6; 6:13; 13:8 (2x); 13:10; 15:24, 26.

Paul’s sentence (vv. 27–29) has three ἵνα clauses (which ordinarily express purpose), each following an instance of the repeated “God chose,” and concludes with this ὅπως clause (also expressing purpose). The three ἵνα clauses express the “realized” purpose of God (Conzelmann, 50), i.e., the process that is currently being worked out in the world. The final ὅπως clause of this verse, then, expresses God’s ultimate aim in all of this.

Gk. μὴ πᾶσα σάρξ. This awkward expression is a Hebraism, the πᾶσα σάρξ reflecting the OT idiom kal-basar. Thus, despite the word order, the μή negates the verb, giving the less than felicitous “so that all flesh may not boast.”

Gk. ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ, lit. “in the presence of God.”

The word group καυχάομαι-καύχησις-καύχημα occurs 55 of 59 times in Paul in the NT; 39 of the 55 occur in 1 and 2 Corinthians (10 in 1 Corinthians; 29 in 2 Corinthians), the vast majority of which are pejorative.

A clearly contrastive δέ has been left out of the NIV. “But as for you,” Paul says, “in contrast to what has been said about the world in the preceding sentences.”

Gk. ἐξ αὐτοῦ, picking up the last word in v. 29: . . . τοῦ θεοῦ. ἐξ αὐτοῦ δὲ. . . .

The ὑμεῖς ἐστε is also emphatic.

What is not clear is the precise nuance of the phrase “of him,” which expresses either “grounds” (NIV; cf. Conzelmann, 51, “by his act”) or “source” (RSV, “He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus”). The former has the difficulty of being an unusual sense for the NT (cf. further Lightfoot, 167). The latter was the unanimous interpretation of the Greek commentators. See, e.g., Chrysostom: “For ye are the children of Him in whose presence it is not meet to glory, having become so through Christ Jesus” (cf. Barrett, “you are related to God”).

Thus as in v. 2 the phrase ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ is probably not locative, but semi-instrumental. By what God has accomplished “in Christ Jesus” they have become his children.

An interpretation still perpetuated by Mare, 197; likewise, and esp. irresponsible exegetically, is the use of this passage further to support an alleged “Wisdom Christology” in Paul; see the Appendix in my Pauline Christology. This is a piece of contemporary mythology in NT scholarship that needs permanently to be laid to rest, since there is not a shred of evidence of any kind in its favor.

Gk. ἀπὸ θεοῦ, rightly translated “from God.” But it is not “wisdom from God” that Christ was made for us; rather it is “wisdom for us from God”; i.e., God made him wisdom on our behalf.

The shift from “you” to “us” is significant here. The sentence begins as a direct word to the Corinthians, as to their existence in Christ Jesus over against the wise of the world. But at this point the perspective broadens to include all who are Christ’s. As Godet remarks: “And this because the matter in question now is, what Christ is objectively to [people], and not the subjective appropriation of Him by believers” (116). Cf. the similar shift in 2:6–16.

Cf. Conzelmann: “The three soteriological concepts are not systematically arranged” (52).

For this perspective note the “Author’s Preface,” xvii.

This is not the common interpretation. For a slightly different approach, which argues for the centrality of justification even here, see R. Y.-K. Fung, “Justification by Faith in 1 & 2 Corinthians,” in Pauline Studies: Essays Presented to Professor F. F. Bruce on His Seventieth Birthday (ed. D. A. Hagner and M. J. Harris; Grand Rapids, 1980), 246–61.

Besides the discussions in TDNT 4:351–56 (F. Büchsel) and NIDNTT 3:195–200 (C. Brown), see L. L. Morris, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross (Grand Rapids, 1955), 9–59; D. Hill, Greek Words and Hebrew Meanings (SNTSMS 5; Cambridge, 1967), 49–81; and I. H. Marshall, “The Development of the Concept of Redemption in the New Testament,” in Reconciliation and Hope (ed. R. Banks; Grand Rapids, 1974), 153–69.

Gk. ἵνα, translated “therefore” in the NIV. The sentence itself is elliptical; probably a form of “to be” is to be understood: “in order that it might be (confirmed) even as it is written.”

For this series see .

Note how the preceding oracle concluded (Jer. 9:12): “Who is wise enough to understand this?”

As Hays () has pointed out, it is altogether likely that Paul assumes his readers will know the cited text within its context of “boasting in the Lord.”

As always in Paul unless the context clearly rules otherwise. As noted in Pauline Christology (129–30), this is the earliest citation of the LXX in the Pauline corpus where the κύριος of the LXX is expressly applied to Christ, without hesitation or explanation. The assumed high Christology of such a citation should not be passed over lightly.

P⁴⁶ * A C 88 436 a r sy^p bo Epiphanius Ambrosiaster read ὑμῖν τὸ μυστήριον (NIV mg. “as I proclaimed to you God’s mystery”), adopted by Garland (83), Thiselton (210), and Collins (118), but in each case for all the wrong reasons. Despite the arguments by Metzger, 480, the reading μαρτύριον (“testimony”) is to be preferred on all counts. Metzger argued that μυστήριον is to be preferred “from an exegetical point of view” (thus basically on internal grounds), in that it “here prepares for its usage in ver. 7.” But that, of course, is precisely why it was substituted for the less common—and less colorful—μαρτύριον of the majority. In fact, it is difficult under any circumstances to imagine that scribes of the second to fourth centuries, for whom the Pauline usage of “mystery” had become a commonplace, substituted “witness” in its place. This alleged substitution is supposed to have been influenced by the usage in 1:6; but that usage is (1) not the same (there it is “the witness of Christ”); (2) too distant to have carried the kind of influence suspected, so that it happened both early and extensively in the early church; and (3) too uncommon to have caused such extensive substitution. Furthermore, as both Barrett, 62–63, and Zuntz, 101, point out, had Paul used “mystery” here in anticipation of its usage in v. 7, he would have both nullified his present point and caused the word “in the latter place [to] lose much of its force” (Zuntz). For the further difficulty in finding an adequate English equivalent for μυστήριον when it does occur, see on v. 7 below.

Later MSS, on the analogy of v. 13, add ἀνθρωπίνης (“human”), which is obviously secondary. But after that, there is considerable difficulty in deciding the original text. The NIV reflects the text of (*) B D 33 181 1175 1506 1739 1881 pc πειθοῖς σοφίας λόγοις (cf. NA²⁷, Lietzmann, Barrett, Conzelmann; cf. T. H. Lim, “Not in Persuasive Words of Wisdom, but in the Demonstration of the Spirit and Power,” NovT 29 [1987], 137–49). The difficulty with this reading is the word πειθοῖς, apparently the dative of πειθός, a word that is otherwise unknown in all of Greek literature (see the discussion of πειθός and πειθώ in BDAG). Paul, of course, is capable of creating such a word, and the early Greek Fathers do not have difficulty with it. The problem, however, is complicated by the reading of P⁴⁶ F G, πειθοῖς σοφίας. Zuntz has (cogently) argued that this reading alone makes sense of how the various corruptions arose (23–25). The ς at the end of πειθοῖς is a result of the simple corruption of doubling the initial ς of σοφίας. The λόγοις was then added, also on the analogy of v. 13, to make sense of what had now become an adjective. With some reluctance this is the position taken in this commentary, for two reasons: (1) this reading is unquestionably the lectio difficilior and more easily explains how the others came about than vice versa. It is extremely difficult to account for the “omission” of λόγοις on any grounds; and in this case it would need to have happened twice, once each in the ancestors of P⁴⁶ and F G; (2) the complete absence of the word πειθός in the entire Greek rhetorical tradition is difficult to explain had there ever been such a word; whereas the regular adj. πιθανός is common. On the other hand, the noun πειθώ is plentiful in this tradition. Given the fact that Paul is here reflecting so much of the language of this tradition, a Pauline creation seems less likely than a scribal corruption. Thus the text would read: “My message and my preaching were not with the persuasion of wisdom, but with the Spirit’s power”; cf. the discussion in Metzger, 481.

This has now been made clear for the average reader by the addition of paragraph titles in the current NIV, which includes this paragraph with 1:18–25 under the heading, “Christ Crucified Is God’s Power and Wisdom,” and begins the next (2:6–16) with “God’s Wisdom Revealed by the Spirit.” The ESV translators have rather altogether disregarded Paul’s own signals by making all of 1:18–31 a single paragraph, with 2:1–5 a separate paragraph with a new heading (“Proclaiming Christ Crucified”).

It is possible, though not argued for as obvious or certain, that Paul intended this paragraph to be an illustration of the second part of 1:25 (“the weakness of God is stronger than human strength”), just as vv. 26–31 would have illustrated the first part (“the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom”). The content of each paragraph certainly moves in this direction; and the structure of the three paragraphs could also be seen to support it. An explanatory γάρ ties vv. 26–31 to v. 25. The κἀγώ that begins this paragraph would then join these two paragraphs to one another. Note that the paratactic καί (joining sentences or sections with the conjunction “and”) is extremely rare in Paul and that both paragraphs also begin with the vocative.

Cf. Conzelmann, 53: “Just as the attitude of the community must accord with the word of the cross, so also must the form of the preaching and the bearing of the preacher.” This seems to make more sense of the argument as a whole than the assertions of those who see this paragraph as somewhat independent from 1:18–31 (e.g., Barrett, Mare, Murphy-O’Connor). Those who see the larger section as a midrashic homily (see ) have conflicting opinions about this paragraph. Ellis, 213–14, views it as the “application” of the midrash (in his view, vv. 18–31); this has more to commend it than Wuellner’s view that it is a “halakic” digression. The difficulties with Ellis’s position are two: (1) vv. 26–31 just as certainly apply 17–25 to their situation as do 2:1–5; (2) the themes of 2:1–5 are all found in 17–25, but not one of them is found in 26–31; therefore, it does not in fact “apply” 26–31.

Cf. the discussion in L. Hartman, “Some Remarks on 1 Cor. 2:1–5,” SEÅ 34 (1974), 109–20. Here in particular the suggestion that Jewish wisdom speculation lies behind the Corinthian theology must yield to the more certain evidence that Paul is reflecting on the Greek rhetorical tradition.

V. 1, “not in word or wisdom” (cf. 1:17); v. 2, “Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1:23); v. 3, I came “in weakness” (1:25); v. 4, my preaching was not in “persuasion of wisdom” (1:17) but in “demonstration of power” (1:23–25); v. 5, that your faith might not rest “on [human] wisdom, but on God’s power” (1:25).

Highlighted in the Greek by the awkward “When I came, I came.” Cf. Rom. 15:29. This is not comparable to the Hebrew idiom “seeing, I saw”; rather, it reflects the ad hoc nature of the letter. Cf. Lightfoot, 170.

Note the repeated “to you” (v. 1), “to you” (v. 1), “with you” (v. 2), “to you” (v. 3), all of which have “your faith” (v. 5) as their goal.

Gk. κἀγώ; rare in Paul (as a paratactic conjunction only here, in v. 3, and in 3:1 in the extant letters). For inexplicable reasons, the original NIV left this conjunction out altogether (beginning with “When I”), as did the NRSV and the NAB.

A clear indication that the one responsible for inserting the numbers got it quite wrong in this case (recognized by the headings inserted by the publisher into the present NIV).

See also Hartman, “Remarks,” 114, who translates, “so it was also with me.”

For reasons now difficult to decipher (some sort of compromise to break a deadlock?), the original NIV translators rendered this phrase “with eloquence or superior wisdom,” thus suggesting that Paul’s ὑπεροχήν was in some way adjectivally related to “wisdom”; whereas Paul’s own phrase, καθ᾽ ὑπεροχὴν λόγου ἢ σοφίας, refers to how he himself was among them.

Gk. καθ᾽ ὑπεροχήν. See BDAG on ὑπεροχή and κατά (B5aβ).

Cf. Hartman, “Remarks,” who shows convincingly that the rejected terms throughout this paragraph are from Greek rhetoric.

Besides the NA²⁷ and UBS⁴ noted above (), see the commentaries by Lietzmann, Moffatt, Héring, O-W, Mare, and Senft; cf. G. Bornkamm, TDNT 4:819; R. E. Brown, The Semitic Background of the Term “Mystery” in the New Testament (FBBS; Philadelphia, 1968), 48–49; Wilckens, 45; R. W. Funk, “Word and Word in I Corinthians 2:6–16,” in Language, 295; Schütz, Paul, 91; Hartman, “Remarks,” 112; A. A. Trites, The New Testament Concept of Witness (SNTSMS 31; Cambridge, 1977), 203. For a full presentation of the textual argument presented here, see the essay in To What End Exegesis? (Eerdmans, 2001), 47–50.

Gk. καταγγέλλω, but less “preaching” as “bearing tidings.” Bornkamm, TDNT 4:819, makes the somewhat irrelevant observation that “the linking of μαρτύριον with καταγγέλλειν . . . is unusual in the NT.” Neither is this verb used with μυστήριον. Given its meaning elsewhere as announcing or proclaiming the gospel (cf. 9:14 and throughout Acts), the case can be made that μαρτύριον fits best as its object here.

And therefore all the more likely to have been changed, than vice versa. See above.

With Barrett, 63 (NIV; R-P, 30), against Lightfoot, 171 (Godet, 124; Holladay, 39), I take this to be an objective genitive. Lightfoot sees the expression in 1:6 as objective (Christ is the object of the preaching); thus this one is subjective (or source), since the testimony to Christ has been borne first of all by God. While that is attractive, the interpretation offered seems less complex, that Paul is bearing witness to God himself and to what he has done.

It is clear from 17:34 that Luke did not so regard it; it is idle psychologizing, and from the distance of nearly two thousand years at that, to think that one can enter into the mind of Paul regarding this experience from what Luke reports.

Gk. οὐ ἔκρινα. This can mean “I refused”; but more likely, despite the unusual word order, Paul intends the οὐ to negate the whole clause, which in effect negates either “to know” or “anything.” Otherwise Field, Notes, 167.

Gk. ἐγενόμην πρὸς ὑμᾶς. The word order of the sentence is emphatic: (lit.) “And I in weakness and in fear and in much trembling became toward you.”

Cf. Godet, 128; Lightfoot, 172; Findlay, 776; R-P, 32; Bachmann, 112 n. 1; Grosheide, 60; otherwise Barrett, 64; Conzelmann, 53. Conzelmann suggests that “πρός, ‘to,’ is too strong”; but that is not quite accurate, since the preposition regularly means “be (in company) with someone” (BDAG 3d). Barrett seems to miss the force of the analogy with 16:10.

Hartman, “Remarks,” 115, suggests that the language is a reflection of the context of the Jeremiah citation in 1:31.

A metaphorical meaning here would not comport with the rest of the evidence in the Corinthian correspondence. What precisely the “weakness” might have been, however, lies beyond our abilities to recapture. The word ἀσθένεɩα is the ordinary one for “illness.” Since Paul had some time previously preached in Galatia as the result of an illness (Gal. 4:13–14), and since later to the Corinthians themselves he will speak of “carrying about in his body the death of Jesus” (2 Cor. 4:10) and of a long-lasting “thorn in his flesh” (2 Cor. 12:7; for an excellent recent discussion of this perplexing text, see Furnish, II Corinthians, 547–50), it is possible that there was a recurrence of such an illness while he was among them. Yet in 1 Cor. 4:9–13, when recounting what it meant for him to be “weak,” he mentions only external hardships (hunger, persecution, brutal treatment, working with his own hands [for the possibility that it refers to his tentmaking, which in the eyes of others would have been considered “weakness,” see R. F. Hock, The Social Context of Paul’s Ministry (Philadelphia, 1980), 60]). In any case the word here most likely refers not to inner feelings, but to how he appeared in the eyes of others. Probably the best we can do is take “weakness” to refer to his “sufferings” or “hardships” and be content not to know precisely what that meant for him here.

Cf. 4:9–13; Gal. 4:13–14; 2 Cor. 4:7–12; 6:4–10; 11:30; 12:7–10; Rom. 8:17–27; Phil. 1:29–30; Col. 1:24–27.

For reasons not easy to decipher, the NIV joins “weakness and fear” and then adds “and with much trembling.” The latter two words, despite the adj. “much” attached only to the “trembling,” regularly occur together, and are certainly intended so here.

On the other hand, Hartman, “Remarks,” 117–18, has argued that these terms are deliberately chosen vis-à-vis the Greek rhetorical tradition (as evidenced, e.g., in Quintilian 12.5.1), thus presenting himself to them as a kind of “anti-rhetor,” so that the “demonstration” will be of the Spirit, not of “wisdom.”

The sentence begins with one of the rare cases in Paul where καί is used as a paratactic conjunction.

For this rendering of Paul’s phrase see .

The English versions do not all fare well here, to the point of sometimes being misleading; indeed the ESV seems to have gotten this phrase quite in reverse with their “my speech and my message.”

As many have pointed out, “methinks the man protesteth too much.” His letters, which at times have all the character of speech, are in fact powerful examples of rhetoric and persuasion. Nonetheless Paul can confidently assert before those who have come to care about such things that his preaching was not of this kind. This seems to make certain that it is not rhetoric in general, but rhetoric of a very specific and well-known kind, that he is disavowing.

Gk. ἀποδείξει (a NT hapax legomenon), a word suggesting more than simply “manifestation,” something akin to “evidence” or “proof.” In Greek rhetoric it was a technical term for a compelling conclusion drawn from the premises. Cf. Quintilian 5.10.7 (“an ἀπόδειξις is clear proof” [Loeb, 2:205]) and Cicero, Acad. 2.8 (“Therefore this is the definition of logical proof, in Greek ἀπόδειξις: ‘a process of reasoning that leads from things perceived to something not previously perceived’ ” [Loeb, 19:501]). Paul thus turns this word on its head, arguing that the “proof” lies not in compelling rhetoric, but in the accompanying visible ἀπόδειξις of the Spirit’s power. Cf. Hartman, “Remarks,” 116–17; Dunn, Spirit, 226–27.

So also Dunn, Jesus, 226–27.

The genitives are at least objective (= evidence that the Spirit is present in power); Barrett, 65, suggests that they are subjective as well (= the manifested Spirit and power bring proof and conviction).

For example, Ellis, 64–65.

Cf. E. Schweizer, TDNT 6:423: The Spirit is understood as “something whose reception may be verified.”

Cf. Robinson, “Word,” 68–82. However, he is too intent on emphasizing their conversion to the exclusion of their own experience of the gifts of the Spirit. That concern probably reflects a later time in the church when the coming of the Spirit is less visibly manifested than seems to have been the case in the NT. It is hard to imagine the Corinthians’ being able to make the distinction. For them to hear the words “the Spirit and power” would automatically have recalled the visible evidences of the Spirit’s presence.

Paul’s Greek sentence creates some considerable difficulties here, in terms of putting it into understandable English. The MS tradition is divided between γάρ (P⁴⁶ B 6 88 181 326 365 1739 1877 2127 2492 m sa bo mss Clement) and δέ ( A C D F G Maj latt sy). On purely textual grounds the former is to be preferred on all counts, since it both is supported by the better MS tradition and is the lectio difficilior (a copyist would scarcely have deliberately created a text with three γάρ’s in a row, and “for” doesn’t seem to make esp. good sense here). Nonetheless, the reading apparently appeared to the editors of the NA²⁷-UBS⁴ to be so difficult that they here abandoned their ordinary principles of textual criticism (the more difficult reading supported by the better MS tradition is usually to be preferred as preserving the original). This is one of the rare instances were Metzger’s presentation of the committee’s choice (481) seems esp. weak. This also presents the English translator with considerable difficulty, so much so that the majority have done as the present NIV, simply leave it out altogether (cf. NAB NRSV NEB ESV).

The NIV has translated the τοῦ of τοῦ πνεύματος as “his.” The αὐτοῦ that appears in the majority of witnesses, incl. D F G latt, is probably a “translational” variant; i.e., a variant that came about through translation into Latin. The NIV text is that of P⁴⁶ * A B C 630 1739 1881 pc cop.

A few Western MSS (F G a b Pel) omit τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, resulting in “except the spirit [Spirit?] within him.”

The MajT, with no support from the early Greek or the versions, adds ἁγίου to πνεύματος.

On the basis of the citations from several Fathers, Zuntz, 221–23, argues that τοῦ θεοῦ is an interpolation (cf. the “C” rating in the UBS⁴). This illustrates a highly questionable use of patristic evidence to support a “shorter text” (cf. G. D. Fee, “The Text of John in The Jerusalem Bible: A Critique of the Use of Patristic Citations in New Testament Textual Criticism,” JBL 90 [1971], 170–72). Not one of the patristic citations is more than probable; none is certain. Internal considerations support the full description, which is carefully balanced with what is said about the believer in v. 12. See the commentary.

The majority of MSS replace the τά of τὰ πάντα with a μέν, thus conforming the πάντα to v. 10 and placing the emphasis on the second clause. See the discussion in Metzger, 482, and Zuntz, 109–10 and 198.

A few MSS (B D* F G 81 it) replace Χριστοῦ with κυρίου, assimilating Paul to the citation of Isa. 40:13.

As G. E. Sterling has rightly observed, “Here the Corinthians’ views come to the fore . . . not [a] wholesome appropriation, but a Pauline reworking of their language” (“ ‘Wisdom among the Perfect’: Creation Traditions in Alexandrian Judaism and Corinthian Christianity,” NovT 37 [1995], 355–84, quotation from 368]). This, of course, also presents us with our difficulties, namely trying to decipher what actually comes from them and what is Paul’s own reworking of their language.

I put quotation marks around this word, easily one of the more difficult words to render into contemporary English, because πνευματικός in Paul is always an adjective having to do with the person or ministry of the Holy Spirit (cf. BDAG 2), whereas the word “spiritual” in English hardly ever, if ever, means that (e.g., it did not occur at all in the eight listings in the 2nd ed. of the Random House Dictionary of the English Language, which appeared the same year [1987] as the first edition of this comm.!). Thus to continue to use this adjective in an English version of the NT, when Paul’s referent is only to the activity of the Holy Spirit, must finally be judged as mistranslation; the ESV, e.g., is esp. at fault here, referring to the Spirit in vv. 4–12, and then rendering the final three as “those who are spiritual”[!], “spiritually discerned,” and “spiritual person.” In the present instance what Paul intends is “the person who considers oneself to be a person of the Spirit, etc.” The present irony in all of this is that everyone agrees that the aim of translation is to put the meaning of a word from the original language into a genuine equivalent in the receptor language, which is precisely what the English word “spiritual” currently fails to do altogether! And for that reason also the adjective will be consistently capitalized in the commentary to make that clear, with back references to this note.

An even greater irony (see ) exists with every attempt to compare what Paul does here with either ancient or modern philosophical systems, which tends to happen in every case where Paul’s πνευματικός is rendered by any form of “spiritual” language that does not include or imply either a direct or an indirect reference to the Holy Spirit. Cf., e.g., R. B. Gaffin, “Some Epistemological Reflections on 1 Cor 2:6–16,” WTJ 57 (1995), 103–24; and G. E. Sterling, “ ‘Wisdom among the Perfect’: Creation Traditions in Alexandrian Judaism and Corinthian Christianity,” NovT 37 (1995), 355–84. Such views turn Paul’s own usage on its head and miss his concerns by several miles. Even more off-center is W. O. Walker’s arguing that the whole passage is a non-Pauline interpolation(!) (JSNT 47 [1992], 75–94), which misses both Paul’s argument in context and the thoroughly Pauline language and grammar throughout; cf. Murphy-O’Connor, Keys, 257–60. This is surely “publish or perish” gone wild.

This has taken several forms. Traditionally (e.g., Goudge, 16), Paul is seen to be arguing that despite what he has said in 2:1–5, he nevertheless does have “deep truth to reveal,” which “requires a developed spiritual character for its appreciation.” Those who continue to take some form of this approach see Paul as addressing a special group (“the mature” or “the spiritual”), the differences having to do with how the special group is perceived. See, e.g., Conzelmann: “The section is dominated by a pneumatic enthusiasm, a distinction between two classes. The pneumatics here do not comprise all Christians, but only a superior class” (57); cf. R. Bultmann, “Karl Barth, The Resurrection of the Dead,” in Faith and Understanding (ET, New York, 1969), 70–72; and Wilckens, 52–96. R. Scroggs argues convincingly against Wilckens’s basic position (that Paul is here adopting the position of his gnostic opponents and thus betrays his own theology), but continues to promote the idea that Paul “must have had an esoteric wisdom teaching entirely separate from his kerygma” (“Paul,” 35). Ellis, 25–26, on the other hand, sees Paul as addressing only the πνευματικοί here, who are defined as those who with Paul possess spiritual gifts. The position argued for in this commentary is in essential agreement with Funk, “Word,” 275–305; cf. B. E. Gärtner, “The Pauline and Johannine Idea of ‘To Know God’ against the Hellenistic Background,” NTS 14 (1967/68), 215–21; and J. Francis, “ ‘As Babes in Christ’—Some Proposals regarding 1 Corinthians 3.1–3,” JSNT 7 (1980), 41–60.

Both Wilckens and Conzelmann admit this (see ). They see Paul as using the ideas and language of his opponents, or of a prior “schema,” which he fails adequately to integrate, thus creating tension or paradox. The logic of this position was finally taken by M. Widmann (“1 Kor 2:6–16. Ein Einspruch gegen Paulus,” ZNW 70 [1979], 44–53), who argued that the passage is a gloss introduced by Paul’s Corinthian opponents as a reply to Paul. See the response by Murphy-O’Connor, Keys, 257–60.

Cf. Funk, “Word,” 300 n. 107: “Paul has simply turned their language, and thus their expectations, inside out in the interest of bringing them face to face with the word of the cross.” Cf. Sterling, 368. However, one must exercise due caution here—not every new term must come from them loaded with foreign nuances—but this seems to make the most sense of the data.

Both the source of their language and Paul’s use of it are hotly debated. Wilckens, Bultmann, and Conzelmann had seen it as gnostic terminology that Paul has less than successfully incorporated so that he comes out looking far more gnostic than Christian (see ). Scroggs in particular had shown the weaknesses in this approach, esp. as it appears in Wilckens. Others see the background as Jewish Hellenism of the type found in Philo; cf. Pearson, 27–37, and Horsley, “Pneumatikos.”

It should be noted, finally, that those who see this section as a previously independent midrash, adapted by Paul to its present context (e.g., Wuellner and Ellis; see ), seem to push the meaning of the term midrash beyond recognizable limits—not to mention rather generally miss the point of the paragraph in its present context. Midrash minimally means an exposition based on OT texts; the texts cited here are not the basis of the argument but are used as supporting evidence only and are in no way the crucial matter.

Gk. δέ, clearly adversative here and thus rightly translated “however” (cf. “yet” in NRSV, GNB, NAB).

A commonly noted phenomenon of this paragraph is the shift to the first person plural throughout. Some have argued that this signals a switch to a special group. See, e.g., Ellis, 24–26, esp. n. 17, who sees it as “the signature of pneumatics,” those special persons with “spiritual gifts.” But that is to make too much of a common Pauline feature (see, e.g., E. Stauffer, TDNT 2:356–58). The shift in this first instance (and in vv. 7 and 13) represents his common editorial “we,” and refers at least to Paul, and perhaps to other preachers/teachers. To that degree it therefore also reflects his underlying apologetic: “But despite what you may think, I do preach wisdom.” Beginning with “our” in v. 7, including “those who love him” in v. 9 and “to us” in v. 10, and continuing through “we” in v. 16, we meet a usage that Funk calls “inclusive-exclusive”; i.e., “on the one hand, it attempts to pull his readers into his own orbit, to embrace them, as it were, within the fold of the faithful. On the other hand, given the polemical context, it verges on exclusion,” which motif “erupts in 3:1f. as the singular” (“Word,” 300 n. 107; cf. 286 n. 46).

For reasons that are less than clear, the ESV translators chose to render Paul’s verb (λαλέω, here in the plural λαλοῦμεν), an ordinary verb for human speech, by the English verb “impart,” which rather totally deflects Paul’s concern, having to do with straightforward speech; to render this verb “impart” here in fact would seem to play right into the hands of the Corinthian error.

For the structure of this kind of argumentation cf. 1:17 and 18, where the wisdom characterized by logos sets up the contrast with the logos of the cross.

Hence the NIV’s addition, “the message” of wisdom.

Scroggs, “Paul,” 35–37, tries to drive a wedge between Paul’s “kerygma and his sophia,” which he calls “clear-cut.” While such a distinction might possibly be made, in the sense that the implications of what one “preaches” in order to evangelize might be more fully explicated when one teaches, to draw a sharp line between these in Paul is to miss rather widely his singular passion for the gospel. On this question see esp. Gärtner, “Idea,” 219: “What is in view is not an intellectual or theoretical, rational knowledge as the Stoics would have understood it. It has nothing to do with an insight into God’s secrets, disclosed in ecstasy or in a mystical way, as Philo explained Abraham’s or Moses’ knowledge of God. . . . Sophia is rather the profound content of God’s revelation . . . [and] in one way can be identified with Christ the Son of God whose death on the cross was an essential expression of the ‘depths of God.’ ” See also the argument in Funk, “Word,” 291–94. Cf. Bornkamm, TDNT 4:820: “2:6–16 remains within the sphere of the λόγος τοῦ σταυροῦ. It is misleading to seek in this section thoughts which are not included in the kerygma itself.”

Gk. ἐν τοῖς τελείοις. Although “mature” is a legitimate rendering of this word in some contexts, here it tends to be rather misleading. Paul’s contrast is simply that between “infants” and “grown-ups”; “maturity” as such is not in the picture at all.

Turner (Syntax, 264) suggests that the ἐν here could stand “pleonastically for the normal dat[ive], to or for.” But as Barrett, 69, has pointed out, that does not at all accord with Pauline usage. Barrett’s own distinction, that this “implies that all may speak” (as in 12:8), is not so apparent. On the use of “we,” see . Paul probably intends nothing significant by this preposition except to describe those among whom God’s wisdom is spoken.

In this case it probably reflects either Hellenistic philosophy (e.g., Plato) or Hellenistic Judaism of the type found in Philo. See P. J. du Plessis, ΤΕΛΕΙΟΣ: The Idea of Perfection in the New Testament (Kampen, 1959), 36–121; cf. Pearson, 27–30, and Horsley, “Pneumatikos,” 281–83, who opt for Philonic influence.

It has also been common to see Paul as here influenced either by the terminology of the mystery cults (Reitzenstein, Bultmann) or by Gnosticism (Wilckens, Conzelmann) to refer to “the initiates.” But this has been effectively refuted by Pearson and others. The mystery rites never use this adjective in this way, and the data from Gnosticism are at least a century or more later.

For this sense of the term, see esp. Du Plessis, ΤΕΛΕΙΟΣ, 178–85; cf. Weiss, 53.

See, e.g., Luke 24:20; Acts 3:17; 13:27 (note the “ignorance” motif in the latter two instances, both sermons). For this observation I am indebted to W. Carr, “The Rulers of This Age—I Corinthians II.6–8,” NTS 23 (1976/77), 20–35, esp. 25–27.

The literature here is immense. Among commentators, see Weiss, Moffatt, Lietzmann, Héring, Barrett, Conzelmann. Among others, see R. Bultmann, Theology of the New Testament (ET, London, 1952), 1:259; Wilckens, 60–63; Scroggs, “Paul,” 41; BDAG.

This view is espoused by such various scholars as O. Cullmann, Christ and Time (ET, London, 1962), 191–206; G. B. Caird, Principalities and Powers (Oxford, 1956), 80–82; G. H. C. MacGregor, “Principalities and Powers: The Cosmic Background of St Paul’s Thought,” NTS 1 (1954/55), 17–28; W. J. P. Boyd, “I Cor. 2:8,” ExpT 68 (1957), 158; and Bruce, 38. As Carr ( above) pointed out, this view has almost nothing in its favor and everything against it. Cullmann’s basis for so arguing rested on a faulty view of the angels of the nations; but the linguistic evidence itself is completely lacking. As Reiling has pointed out, the debate itself is as old as Theodore of Mopsuestia (J. Reiling, “Wisdom and the Spirit: An Exegesis of 1 Corinthians 2,6–16,” in Text and Testimony: Essays in Honour of A. F. J. Klijn [ed. T. Baarda et al.; Kampen, 1988], 200–211).

In the first edition I noted here that, despite the evidence against it, it will probably not die easily, which in fact was played out in the article by M. E. Adeyemi (“The Rulers of This Age in First Corinthians 2:6–8: An Exegetical Exposition,” DBM 28 [1999], 38–45), although he was not influenced by the gnostic backgrounds that I had critiqued in the first edition.

The linguistic evidence is decisive: (1) the term ἄρχοντες is never equated with the ἀρχαί of Col. 1:16 and Eph. 6:12; (2) when ἄρχων appears in the singular it sometimes refers to Satan; but (3) there is no evidence of any kind, either in Jewish or Christian writings until the second century, that the term was used of demons; and (4) in the NT it invariably refers to earthly rulers and unambiguously does so in Paul in Rom. 13:3. See G. D. Fee, New Testament Exegesis (3rd ed.; Philadelphia, 2002), 84–89. Some see the qualifier “of this age” to be determinative, since Satan is referred to in John’s gospel as “the ruler of the world” (12:31; 14:30; 16:11); but that seems a remote connection at best, since the phrase in John belongs to his special vocabulary. Nothing like it appears in Paul (esp. not in Eph. 2:2). While the “powers” do play a significant role in Pauline theology, there is no evidence that they are responsible for the death of Christ; rather, Christ triumphed over them by his death (Col. 2:15). On this whole question see G. Miller, “ΑΡΧΟΝΤΩΝ ΤΟΥ ΑΙΩΝΟΥ ΤΟΥΤΟΥ—a New Look at 1 Corinthians 2:6–8,” JBL 91 (1972), 522–28; and esp. Carr, “Rulers,” which also appears in somewhat abbreviated form in Angels and Principalities: The Background, Meaning and Development of the Pauline Use of hai archai kai hai exousiai (SNTSMS 42; Cambridge, 1981), 118–20.

Gk. ἀλλά, the strong adversative. On Paul’s use of the conjunction here, see B. Frid, “The Enigmatic ἀλλά in 1 Cor 2:9,” NTS 31 (1985), 603–11.

The θεοῦ is emphatic, θεοῦ σοφίαν; the genitive is probably possessive in this case, although it may also lean toward source, i.e., wisdom that not only belongs to God, but also comes from God. The original NIV’s rendition “we speak of God’s secret wisdom” was both wrong and quite misleading.

This is another phrase (ἐν μυστηρίῳ) that has caused some to see Paul as reflecting the mystery cults or Gnosticism. But again that not only misses Paul’s own Jewish background, but the whole point of the argument as well. On the unlikelihood of the mystery cults influencing the NT at all, see G. Wagner, Pauline Baptism and the Pagan Mysteries (ET, Edinburgh, 1967). On the term “mystery” in Paul, see R. E. Brown, Semitic Background; cf. G. Bornkamm, TDNT 4:817–24: “In sum, μυστήριον . . . in the NT . . . betrays no relation to the mystery cults.”

It would then refer to the form of the instruction that would be accessible to the τέλειοι, but inaccessible to the νήπιοι. As we have noted throughout, that is contextually an unlikely interpretation. For an advocacy of the adverbial understanding, see B. Frid, “The Enigmatic ΑΛΛΑ in 1 Corinthians 2.9,” NTS 31 (1985), 605.

See Col. 1:26–27; 2:2; 4:3; Eph. 1:9; 3:3, 4, 9; 6:19. In these letters “mystery” esp., though not exclusively, refers to the inclusion of the Gentiles in the salvation of God.

Three times in 1 Corinthians it appears in the plural (4:1; 13:2; 14:2). The latter two in particular reflect the idea of things still hidden, but revealed or expressed in the form of spiritual gifts. On the usage in 14:2 and 15:51 see the commentary ad loc.

For further discussion of “mystery” in this passage and in Paul, see S. Kim, The Origin of Paul’s Gospel (Tübingen, 1981), 75–78.

Gk. προορίζω; cf. Rom. 8:29–30; Eph. 1:5, 11; Acts 4:28.

Cf. 1 Thess. 2:12; 2 Thess. 1:10, and esp. Rom. 8:17 and 8:29–30.

The NIV (correctly, given their translational theory of dynamic equivalence) treats v. 8a as a new sentence. In fact, it is a relative clause that marks the fourth qualification of God’s wisdom.

For the meaning of “rulers of this age” see above on v. 6.

Given this concern on Paul’s part to root God’s wisdom in the historical event of Christ’s death, and the rulers’ implication in that death, it is surprising to see this clause interpreted by some as the key to a gnostic, mythological understanding of the whole passage. The “ignorance” motif is alleged to be a reflection of the gnostic Redeemer myth, where the Aeons were ignorant of who Christ really was, namely “the Lord of Glory,” which is also seen as mythological language. For this view see esp. Wilckens, 70–80; it was repeated in Conzelmann, 63, and even found a surprising, though greatly qualified, supporter in Barrett, 71–72. More recent commentaries have rightly ignored it. Besides the lack of certainty that there ever was such a myth, nothing in the language or context of this verse even remotely hints at such a mythological understanding. The “rulers” are not demonic powers; and even if they were, the evidence of the Gospels, which reflects the view of the early church, is that the demons were the only ones who did in fact recognize Jesus. Moreover, in this context it is not Jesus about whom the “rulers” are ignorant, but about God’s wisdom, which was displayed in the very crucifixion for which they were responsible.

Cf. the similar irony in the Peter speech in Acts 3:15, “you killed the author of life”! See also Acts 2:22–25.

These difficulties have led to a nearly impossible interpretation at both the popular and scholarly level, to the effect that the content of the passage speaks to what is yet future. Thus, “eye has not yet seen, etc., what God yet has in store for those who love him.” But that not only misses what is actually said, but also misses the context rather widely.

The original NIV (“no mind has conceived”) had correctly captured the sense of the Hebrew idiom, but unfortunately left out the word ἀνθρώπου, which in this context therefore misses Paul’s point altogether. God’s wisdom is something that no merely human mind has, or could have, conceived.

What the syntax does not seem to allow is an interpretation such as that found in the RSV (corrected in the NRSV), which saw the quotation as the beginning of the next section of the argument (RSV: “But, as it is written, ‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him’ God has revealed to us through the Spirit”). In this view the entire quotation functions as the object of the verb “revealed” in v. 10. But this destroyed Paul’s syntax altogether by missing the adversative force of the ἀλλά of v. 9 and running roughshod over the explanatory γάρ that begins v. 10.

This ἀλλά has been a major source of difficulty for many. For a helpful discussion of the alternatives, see Frid, “Enigmatic ΑΛΛΑ,” 603–6. The one view that does not seem likely is that it repeats the ἀλλά of v. 7 and that v. 9 should then have an understood λαλοῦμεν as its verb: “But even if it is in mystery, we speak etc.” As Frid rightly notes, this makes meaningless the ἀλλά of v. 9.

Thus the second ἅ functions very much like a ταῦτα.

Frid, “Enigmatic ΑΛΛΑ,” 610 n. 45, who also recognizes the parallel with Rom. 15:3 and that v. 9 therefore stands in contrast to v. 8a, offers a slightly different solution, which has a similar net result. He sees the sentence as an ellipse and would add the verb from v. 8, “we know.” Thus: “None of them knew, but, as it is written, what things etc., these things we do know.” This understanding has now also been adopted by Collins (131–32) and Garland (91), but not so Thiselton (255–56).

LXX: ἀπὸ τοῦ αἰῶνος οὐκ ἠκούσαμεν/οὐδὲ οἱ ὀφθαλμοὶ ἡμῶν εἶδον . . ./ἃ ποιήσεις τοῖς ὑπομένουσιν ἔλεον (“From eternity we have not heard,/nor have our eyes seen . . . ,/what things you shall do for those who wait for mercy”).

The phrase “for those who love God” appears again in Rom. 8:28 (and possibly 1 Cor. 8:3, q.v.), thus suggesting that Paul is comfortable with it. It has a rich OT background (e.g., Exod. 20:6; Deut. 5:10; 7:9, and scores of others), but nowhere does anything like the present clause appear in this form.

See the evidence mustered by M. Stone and J. Strugnell that the citation is from an otherwise unknown Apocalypse of Elijah (The Books of Elijah, Parts 1–2 [SBLTT 18; Missoula, 1979]).

See Ellis, Use, 35, for a discussion and bibliography. See also A. Feuillet, “L’énigme de I Cor., II,9,” RB 70 (1963), 52–74 (digest in Eng. in ThDig 14 [1966], 143–48); and K. Berger, “Zur Diskussion über die Herkunft von I Cor. ii.9,” NTS 24 (1977/78), 170–83.

Cf. Ellis, Use, 22–25.

Cf. Reiling (), 205.

See .

Including the present NIV (cf. NRSV, ESV, NAB); the NEB is the single notable exception (“. . . the Spirit. For the Spirit explores everything”).

Gk. ἀπεκάλυψεν, the verb that became the technical one for the “divine revelation of certain transcendent secrets” (BDAG); see, e.g., Ps. 98:2 (LXX 97:2). This becomes a particularly well-developed idea in Jewish and Christian “apocalyptic,” e.g., Dan. 2:22 (cf. vv. 19 and 28 Theod.). For Paul this is the ordinary verb for supernatural revelation of any kind.

The emphatic position of ὑμῖν is not so much to contrast “us” with those who cannot perceive God’s ways, but to place “us” in immediate juxtaposition with “those who love him.” Thus: “For to us, namely those who love him, God has revealed what is otherwise hidden.” On the significance of the first person plural here, see .

Although Paul does not so designate him here, the argument of the entire passage confirms that he is referring to the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity. The ease with which Paul flows in and out of the language “Spirit” and “Holy Spirit” makes this decisive. Cf., e.g., 1 Thess. 1:5 and 1 Cor. 2:4, where in similar contexts Paul in the earlier letter designated him as “Holy Spirit,” but not in the latter. In this letter, see 6:11 and 19 and esp. 12:3. On the other hand, one must be careful not to read too much later Christian theology back into Paul’s language here. From what is said in this paragraph one may conclude that the Spirit is divine, but it goes beyond Paul’s concern to address the question whether the Holy Spirit is a distinct Person. Nonetheless passages like this one, and 12:4–6, serve as the “stuff” out of which the later full Trinitarian formulations are (legitimately) mined. On this question see D. W. Martin, “ ‘Spirit’ in the Second Chapter of First Corinthians,” CBQ 5 (1943), 181–95.

On this matter see esp. Gärtner, “Idea” (see ). Whether the actual “source” of Paul’s usage is his own experience or an adaptation from the Corinthians themselves is a moot point. In either case, two things are certain: (1) this is the only occurrence of this principle in the extant Pauline corpus, and (2) as usual he has so thoroughly adapted it to his own theology that the question of source becomes nearly irrelevant.

In one of the mysteries of English translation the original NIV, with no textual or lexical evidence of any kind, rendered this “but God.”

There is no object to the verb ἀπεκάλυψεν in Paul’s sentence. Probably, as Godet, 147, observes, that is because the emphasis lies on the fact of revelation here, not on what is revealed. The context makes it certain that something very much like “his wisdom” is in view.

See, e.g., a passage like Dan. 2:20–23. Although there is no mention of the Spirit as the agent of revelation, the linguistic parallels with v. 22 (“God reveals deep and hidden things”) are of such a nature that one scarcely needs to search Greek or gnostic sources for this terminology.

What lies behind such an idea can be illustrated from Rom. 8:27, where God is called the One who searches people’s hearts (an epithet with deep OT roots: e.g., 1 Sam. 16:7; Ps. 139:1, 2, 23). In this passage the fact that God searches the hearts of others functions as the presupposition that he must a fortiori also know the unspoken desires of his own Spirit. On this see Cranfield, Romans, 1:424.

Gk. γάρ. This piling up of γάρ’s is a typical feature of Pauline style. Cf. 1:17, 18, 19, 21; 3:3, 4; 9:15, 16, 17; and many others.

The one difference between the two parts of the sentence has to do with the verb “to know” (οἶδεν/ἔγνωκεν). The older commentators suggested that the differences have to do with the capacity for “knowing” itself (e.g., Lightfoot, 179; R-P, 44); more likely ἔγνωκεν is chosen in the second instance because it constitutes a truer perfect and suggests the sense of “no one has ever known” (cf. Barrett, 74).

The phrase “the man’s spirit within him” is almost identical to the LXX of Zech. 12:1: πνεῦμα ἀνθρώπου ἐν αὐτῷ.

It seems clear in this case that the word πνεῦμα is another expression for νοῦς. Cf. v. 16, where to have the Spirit of God is the same as to have the νοῦς of Christ.

The δέ that joins the sentence to what precedes is “consecutive” or “resumptive.” It should be translated “now,” resuming the point of v. 10a, after the mild digression of vv. 10b–11.

Note again the interchangeability of αἰών ([this] “age”) and κόσμος ([this] “world”). See above on 1:20.

As throughout the passage the interpretation of the “we” is crucial to one’s understanding of the sense of the whole passage. Those who see this as polemical (in the sense of the Corinthians vis-à-vis Paul) suggest that he is here arguing with them that he, too, has the Spirit and not they alone (e.g., Conzelmann, 66–67). There can be little question, of course, that Paul is included in the “we” of this verse, and in a secondary sense it may reflect this polemic (as vv. 15–16 also probably do); but the language “what God has freely given us” echoes “our glory” in v. 7 and “to us who love him” in vv. 9 and 10 and seems to make most sense as referring esp. to the Corinthians.

The usage in vv. 7–10, plus the connection of this verse with v. 10 by means of the resumptive δέ (see above) and the fact that in Paul the language “receive the Spirit” elsewhere refers only to believers in general (see the following note), seems also to deny the force of the assertion by W. C. Kaiser that “Paul is not talking about the Spirit that animates believers, but about the Holy Spirit’s operation in delivering the Scripture to the apostle” (see “A Neglected Text in Bibliology Discussions: I Corinthians 2:6–16,” WTJ 43 [1981], 301–19, quotation from 315). Kaiser’s concern is indeed picked up in v. 13, although the language “delivering the Scripture to the apostle” seems to be a considerable distance from Paul’s own concern and intent.

This is ordinary NT language for the gift of the Spirit; cf. Acts 2:38; 10:47; 19:2; 2 Cor. 11:4; Gal. 3:2, 14; Rom. 8:15. In Paul it refers primarily to Christian conversion.

This was suggested, e.g., by Ellis, 29–30, on the assumption that it is related to “the rulers of this age” in vv. 6 and 8, whom he incorrectly understands to be demonic powers. Cf. Barrett, 75.

The NIV has thus correctly caught the sense of the contrast in this sentence, but by so translating it is also forced to miss the exact repetition of the designation from v. 11. Thus: “. . . except the Spirit of God; and we have . . . received the Spirit of God.”

Gk. εἰδῶμεν, picking up the verbs from v. 11.

Conzelmann, 67, candidly acknowledges as much, but is so enamored with Hellenistic parallels in the paragraph that he immediately qualifies it by saying that “χάρις, too, can assume the tenor of the mysteries and denote the power within the pneumatic, thus becoming synonymous with πνεῦμα. It will therefore be necessary to look for further indications.” But why should one do so when both the argument itself and the terminology are so thoroughly Pauline?

Gk. ἃ καὶ λαλοῦμεν, lit. “what things also we speak.” “What things,” of course, refers to “what God has freely given us.” λαλοῦμεν is a repetition of the verb from vv. 6 and 7, and therefore seems clearly resumptive.

Since λαλοῦμεν repeats the verb of vv. 6 and 7, it is also likely that the “we” here picks up the editorial “we” of those sentences. Hence “I.” See .

The noun πνεύματος lacks the definite article, thus indicating that the presence or absence of the article with πνεῦμα does not determine whether Paul intends the Spirit in any given instance. Otherwise N. Turner, Grammatical Insights into the New Testament (Edinburgh, 1965), 17–22. The clue to this usage, both in Paul and in Luke-Acts, is probably related to various constructions with certain cases and has nothing to do with the Spirit’s personality. Cf. the usage of the article with personal names in the Gospel of John (G. D. Fee, NTS 17 [1970/71], 168–83).

O-W, 158, suggest the alternative possibility of “learned words of human wisdom,” but they make too much of the subtle shades of meaning. Héring, 20, on the unfounded assertion that the common translation would only be possible if διδακτός were a noun, adopts a conjectural omission of λόγοις and thus translates: “amongst people instructed in human philosophy.” But such conjectures are unnecessary, esp. since the “subjective” or “agency” use of the genitive with this adjective is found also in John 6:45, which Héring overlooks.

Gk. πνευματικοῖς πνευματικὰ συγκρίνοντες. This is the first of 15 occurrences of this adjective in this letter; apart from two occurrences in 1 Pet. 2:5 (where it means something close to our English word “spiritual”) it is a distinctively Pauline word in the NT, and is invariably a reference to the Holy Spirit. For understandable reasons, the present phrase has been something of a bane for interpreters. The KJV unfortunately rendered it “comparing spiritual things with spiritual,” giving rise to the use of this text at the popular level to support the analogy of Scripture, i.e., comparing one text with another so as to derive its meaning from within Scripture itself. That is a useful hermeneutical principle, based on belief in the common inspiration by the Spirit of all Scripture, but it is quite beside Paul’s present point.

It is possible, though less probable, that it is neuter and simply means something like “spiritual means” or “spiritual things” in general, but even here the Holy Spirit would be the point of reference for Paul.

The participial construction, modifying λαλοῦμεν, argues for the closest possible tie to what has already been said, not a loose addition anticipating what follows. Furthermore, one esp. would expect the definite article τοῖς with πνευματικοῖς if “those who are spiritual” were intended.

Most recently Kaiser, “Bibliology,” 318, and MacArthur, 63; cf. Lightfoot, 180–81, and Goodspeed (translation). Kaiser does so on the basis of the not totally relevant assertion, borrowed from Godet, that “the meaning of ‘interpreting’ for this verb is foreign in the N.T. and Classical Greek.” Nor is there any NT usage meaning “combine”; and the comparison with classical Greek is particularly irrelevant, since the word was regularly used with the meaning of “interpreting” or “explaining” in the LXX (e.g., Gen. 40:8, 16, 22; 41:12, 13, 15; Num. 15:34; Dan. 5:7), but never in the “classical” sense.

See, e.g., the use in Gen. 40:8, 16, 22, where it is used of Joseph’s ability to “interpret” the Pharaoh’s dreams.

Holladay, 47.

This is the language of Funk, “Word,” 296.

This is the view of Wilckens, 89–91, who sees it as a gnostic term being taken over by Paul; cf. Pearson, 38–39; Horsley, “Pneumatikos”; and Davis, 117–25, who see it as evidence of Philonic influences.

See the discussion of these terms in TDNT 9:608–63 (E. Schweizer), and NIDNTT 3:676–86 (G. Harder).

Gk. πνευματικῶς.

Gk. ἀνακρίνω; cf. v. 15 [2x]; 4:3 [2x], 4; 9:3; 10:25, 27; 14:24.

The emphasis lies on the process of examining, rather than the verdict itself, implied in the root verb κρίνω.

Set off in the Greek text by an adversative δέ.

The context seems to demand such a meaning for πνευματικός. To suggest, as does Grudem, 158, that it here means “spiritually mature” seems to miss Paul’s argument.

He has left out the middle line of three (“who has become his adviser?”), since it would fail to serve his present purpose. According to Robertson (Grammar, 724), the ὅς that introduces the second line of the quotation “denotes a consecutive idea, ‘so as to.’ ”

Cf. Wilckens, 95. This line is often interpreted otherwise, namely as support of line A, implying that the question from Isaiah is open-ended at this point, to be answered by the next line. That is, “The spiritual person judges all things, . . . for who has known the mind of Christ? The answer? We have.” But that puts too much stress on the grammar (the δέ of the final line is better understood as an adversative, esp. in light of the emphatic “we” and the change to “mind of Christ”), and does not fit the argument as well.

The substitution of “Christ” for the “Lord” of the Isaiah passage probably has no significance for the present argument, but it does indicate something of Paul’s own Christology! For him Christ is Lord; therefore when the OT speaks of the Lord, he sees in such language references to Christ himself. See also in this regard the interchange of the “Spirit of God” and the “Spirit of Christ” in Rom. 8:9.

Gk. σαρκίνοις (“fleshly” = composed of flesh). In v. 3 Paul shifts to σαρκικός (“fleshly” = having the characteristics of flesh; associated with flesh). Paul keeps this distinction in his use of σάρκινος in 2 Cor. 3:3 (“. . . but on tablets of human hearts,” i.e., on hearts composed of flesh) and σαρκικός in 2 Cor. 1:12 (“worldly wisdom”; i.e., wisdom based on the point of view of the sinful nature). The later witnesses, not surprisingly, read σαρκικοῖς here against the σαρκίνοις of P⁴⁶ A B C* D* 6 33 945 1175 1739 pc. For the possible significance see the commentary on v. 1.

ἔτι is omitted in P⁴⁶ B 0185. Cf. Zuntz, 40: “In I Cor. iii.2 the omission, by P⁴⁶ B, of ἔτι after οὐδέ so greatly improves the style as to make the assumption of a mere scribal error difficult. . . . I find it hard to accept the current assertion that οὐδὲ ἔτι νῦν means ‘and not even now’: this would be οὐδὲ νῦν. The majority text to me suggests the meaning ‘but not any longer.’ The scribes may have anticipated ἔτι from the following clause. If Paul actually wrote it, he conflated two expressions: (1) ‘not even now (οὐδὲ νῦν) you are able,’ and (2) ‘even now (ἔτι καὶ νῦν) you are still unable.’ ” Most likely Paul is responsible for it, and P⁴⁶ B represent an Alexandrian “improvement of style” (Metzger, 482).

In the two instances of σαρκικοί in this verse, the Western MSS D F G, joined by P⁴⁶ in the second instance, read σάρκινοι. Zuntz, 99, prefers this reading, since Paul generally uses σάρκινος to refer to human beings. But here the word takes on the moral overtones of σάρξ.

P⁴⁶ D F G 33 Maj a b sy have the additional words καὶ διχοστασίαι (“and dissensions”), against P¹¹ A B C P Ψ 81 630 1175 1506 1739 1881 r vg sy Clement Origen Didymus. This is not an easy decision. An early and widespread “omission” of these words is particularly difficult to account for. But so is an “addition,” which is best explained as an intrusion from Gal. 5:20 (although the two words are not juxtaposed there). On the whole, despite the early combination of P⁴⁶ with the Western MSS, interpolation seems more easily accounted for than omission, since the latter could scarcely have been accidental, and one cannot imagine a reason for deliberate excision; so also Metzger, 482–83.

The MajT, against all early evidence both East and West, substitutes σαρκικοί for ἄνθρωποι, a patent corruption that misses Paul’s point by a wide margin.

Note esp. the change of themes from wisdom, folly, and cross to Spiritual, babes, and mere humans, with the concept of being “people of the Spirit” as the link between the two.

Gk. πνευματικοί, which for obvious reasons, is very difficult to put into English. In its 24 occurrences in Paul’s letters it is almost always an adjective (here turned noun) referring to the Holy Spirit, and ordinarily means “people who have the Spirit.” Unfortunately, the traditional rendering “spiritual” (as e.g., the NRSV, ESV, NAB and most others) leads the reader in every imaginable wrong direction. Indeed, in the 1987 Random House Dictionary a reference to the Holy Spirit is the eighth entry, and then only as a kind of addendum. Only the present NIV and the NEB before that have correctly rendered this “people who have/live by the Spirit,” so that Paul’s own use of this term gets its proper hearing. Every time I hear the word “spiritual,” I am reminded of my own father’s description of someone as being “so spiritual,” which had very little relationship to the Spirit, but referred to a kind of “aura” this person presented by the way she composed herself.

It is also of some interest, but ultimately quite unfortunate, that the lower case “spiritual” continues to be used in the later commentaries, even though in each case one can usually find a reference to the Spirit in the ensuing discussion (although in Collins there is only a single passing note on 142). In the end, the continuing use of the English adjective “spiritual” to render Paul’s Greek is simply misleading at best, and all too often in rather total disregard of what Paul himself was intending by this word.

These two items are brought together again in the preliminary “conclusion” of 3:18–23: “If any of you think you are wise. . . . So then, no more boasting about men!”

This seems by far the best answer to the question whether Paul himself makes distinctions between believers within the congregation, an idea that almost all commentators, including those who believe so, recognize as inherently problematic—given the current problem of divisiveness within the congregation and Paul’s own theology as seen elsewhere. See the commentary on 2:6–16. Cf. Funk, “Word,” 299: “Does Paul nevertheless make a distinction within the congregation? Indeed he does! The question is what kind of distinction and on what basis?” After giving a theological basis for what Funk refers to as a “dialectical” tension, he says of this passage: “Thus it may be said that Christians both have (insofar as they walk according to the spirit) and do not have (insofar as they fall short of the norm) the spirit.” On the other hand, to suggest two meanings for πνευματικός (as, e.g., du Plessis, ΤΕΛΕΙΟΣ, 183–85, and Mare, 204) misses Paul’s point. What Mare suggests as necessitating a different meaning here from 2:14–15 can better be subsumed under the ironic usage argued for here, without the difficulties of the other view.

He then proceeds to address this question directly for three paragraphs, but interestingly not in terms of quarreling per se, but in terms of their misunderstanding of the nature and role of leadership in the church (3:5–15), which in turn reflects their misunderstanding of the nature of the church itself (3:16–17). See below on 3:5–17.

Gk. λαλῆσαι, the infinitive of the same verb used about his preaching in 2:6, 7, and 13.

See . This stands against the commonly held view that these words mean basically the same thing. If so, then one wonders why Paul himself uses two words. If the difference is somewhat subtle, it is nonetheless by Paul’s own choice and needs to be taken seriously. See, e.g., R-P, 52; Moulton, Grammar, 2:378.

For Hellenism, see Epict. 2.16.39: “Are you not willing, at this late date, like children, to be weaned and to partake of more solid food?” (Loeb, 333); for Hellenistic Judaism, see Philo, agric. 9: “But seeing that for babes [νηπίοις] milk [γάλα] is food, but for grown men [τελείοις] wheaten bread, there must also be soul-nourishment, such as is milk-like suited to the time of childhood . . . and such as is adapted to grown men in the shape of instructions leading the way through wisdom and temperance and all virtue” (Loeb, 3:113); cf. congr.qu.er. 19 and omn.prob.lib. 160.

See, e.g., W. Grundmann, “Die nēpioi in der urchristlichen Paränese,” NTS 5 (1958/59), 188–205, and most of the commentaries.

In this regard see esp. Francis, “Babes,” 43–48.

Cf. 1 Thess. 2:7, 11; 1 Cor. 4:14–16; 2 Cor. 6:13; Gal. 4:19; Phil. 2:22; Phlm. 10.

So also 13:11, although the imagery there is not quite so pejorative. There is behavior appropriate to infancy; what is not appropriate is for an adult so to behave. Cf. 14:20.

The same antithesis occurs throughout chaps. 1–4. E.g., Paul affirms that they are “enriched in every way” in 1:4–5; but he says it sarcastically in 4:8. So also with the use of “wise” and “fool” in the earlier part of the argument. The wise are foolish, and the foolish wise, depending on how they hear the message of Christ crucified.

“Hard Sayings, I Corinthians 3:2,” Theology 69 (1966), 21.

Unfortunately, the NIV fails to keep the play on words that begins and ends these two sentences: “For my part I was not able [ἠδυνήθην], because you were not yet able [ἐδύνασθε].”

Again, Hooker, 20: “The Corinthians’ failure to understand the wisdom spoken in a mystery is not due to the fact that Paul is withholding it from them, but is the result of their own inability to digest what he is offering them”; or to advance the imagery somewhat one is reminded of the ongoing struggle parents have with children in the process of trying to help them “grow up.”

Gk. ἀλλά; Turner, Syntax, 3:330: “Introducing a strong addition, ἀλλά . . . may be yes, indeed.”

See .

Gk. ἔρις; see on 1:10.

Gk. ζῆλος. The combination also occurs in 2 Cor. 12:20; Gal. 5:20; Rom. 13:13. In Paul the word can be either positive (= “zeal”) or negative, depending on the context. Here it is clearly pejorative, “the kind of zeal that does not try to help others, but to harm them, the predominant concern being for personal advancement” (A. Stumpff, TDNT 2:882). Cf. 13:4: “Love οὐ ζηλοῖ.”

So BDAG.

Another explanatory γάρ, apparently omitted in the NIV as implied in the argument itself, but kept in most recent English versions (NRSV, ESV, NAB, REB [NEB “indeed”]). As in 2:10–12, there is here a piling up of γάρ’s, one sentence giving way to the next, as one explanation follows hard on the heels of the former.

The καί is pleonastic in this instance: “Are you not still of the flesh, that is, are you not behaving like mere humans?”

B. W. Winter, After Paul (31–43), prefers to render this “operating in a secular fashion,” which probably gets very close in English to Paul’s concern here.

Gk. περιπατεῖτε; see H. Seesemann, TDNT 5:944–45. See also .

Cf. the variations on the theme in 1 Thess. 2:12; 4:1, 12; 1 Cor. 7:17; Rom. 6:4; 8:1, 4; 13:13; Col. 2:6; Eph. 2:10; 4:1; 5:2.

The MajT, supported by P⁴⁶ C D F G, reads τίς in both instances (“Who . . . Who”), thus emphasizing the personalities. Paul’s own context emphasizes their functions, and is therefore decisive for τί . . . τί (as is the answer in v. 7: οὐ . . . ἐστίν τι). The masculine, although very early, was probably the result of conforming to the immediately following masculine διάκονοι. See Metzger, 483, and Zuntz, 131–32.

The later MajT, against P⁴⁶ A B C D* F G P 048 33 81 629 1739 pc latt co, has the reverse order, “What, after all, is Paul? And what is Apollos?” This is an assimilation to v. 4, and reflects a tendency to give Paul greater prominence; cf. Metzger, 483.

The awkwardness of this sentence was mitigated in the later textual tradition by the addition of ἀλλ’ ἤ, so that the answer becomes part of the question in the TR. Thus the KJV: “Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but servants by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man?” The REV’s “God’s agents” misses Paul a bit too much.

As Munck put it: “The Corinthians have chosen to regard the Christian teachers as teachers of wisdom. Their valuation of them is at once too high and too low. Too high, because they have given them the stamp of authority without regard to their position as servants of God and Christ, and at the same time too low because they have subjected them to their own (the Corinthians’) judgment” (Paul, 157).

Gk. οὖν. The NIV has a nice touch here and precisely captures the force of the particle in its context; cf. BDAG 3 and 1cβ.

Reflecting elements of the diatribe (chiasm with v. 5; rhetorical objection); cf. Conzelmann, 73.

See 2 Cor. 3:6; 6:4; 11:23; Rom. 16:1; Col. 1:7, 23, 25; 4:7; Eph. 3:7; 6:21; 1 Tim. 4:6. If one were to add the noun and verb, which describe his work as “ministry,” the count is even greater. Eventually it became a technical term for an “office” in the church (“deacon,” Phil. 1:1; 1 Tim. 3:8). On this question see esp. Ellis, 6–15, although he tends to see the term as more specialized than the data warrant, and H. W. Beyer, TDNT 2:81–93.

Cf. the contemptuous attitude toward serving found in Plato, in the words of Socrates’ antagonist Callicles: “How can a man be happy if he is servant to anybody at all?” (Gorg. 492b). It should be noted that some of the Cynic philosophers considered themselves servants to other Cynics and in the “service of God.” See, e.g., Epict. 3.22.63–109, although his “service” was not in ministering directly to the needs of others but in keeping himself aloof so as to render greater service by “having leisure for the public interest.” This is a far cry from Paul’s use of the imagery.

See esp. 8:6 below; cf. now the full discussion in Pauline Christology, 134–47.

Implied in the KJV: “even as the Lord gave to every man,” and probably in the NASB: “even as the Lord gave opportunity to each one;” cf. TCNT: “and that only as the Lord helped each of you.” Most of the rest of the English translation tradition has apparently preferred to leave the text quite ambiguous (NRSV, ESV, “as the Lord has assigned to each”). No English, German, or French commentator seems to have opted for this interpretation.

Although H. Riesenfeld thinks otherwise, noting that the use of γεώργιον in the LXX ordinarily reflects a vineyard, and the frequent use of this image for Israel made it a natural in this case. See “Parabolic Language in the Pauline Epistles,” in The Gospel Tradition (ET, Philadelphia, 1970), 197–99. Analogies of various kinds from farming are well known in antiquity, not least from Jesus himself. The fourth-century sophist Libanius uses language almost identical to Paul’s first two lines: “I planted the good seed; you water it; the world plucks its fruit” (cf. Loeb, 1:33).

The change to the imperfect should not be missed, as the original NIV tended to (“God made it grow”). The NASB, however, is too stilted: “but God was causing the growth.” The imperfect implies that God was in the activity of both, and continues to be so even now.

As Conzelmann, 73, comments (although I would put less emphasis on “party” as such): “The result of this conception of [ministry] is to break up both the Paul party and the Apollos party alike. Both lose their heads.”

Gk. ὥστε. The argumentative nature of this epistle calls forth this conjunction, used in this way, several times: 3:21; 4:5; 5:8; 7:38; 10:12; 11:27, 33; 14:22, 39; 15:58; cf. Phil. 2:12. For this usage see Moule, 144.

The language is Barrett’s (85).

In Paul’s sentence the word θεός functions in apposition to the substantive ὁ αὐξάνων: “but the one who makes things grow—God.”

Thus the “have one purpose” of the NIV captures the sense of the language in the context of the analogy; cf. NAB: “work to the same end,” and NEB, “they work as a team.” The latter puts a bit more emphasis on their being equal, as does the RSV (“are equal”).

This γάρ may also be causal, giving the grounds for the preceding statements. There has been some debate over its precise reference point, v. 8a or 8b. But as Conzelmann, 74, notes, that is an unnecessary disjuncture. More likely, given the second clause (“You the church are God’s field”), it reaches back through v. 8 to embrace the entire argument of the paragraph.

For the significance of this metaphor in Paul, see . Some (e.g., Conzelmann, 74–75; Riesenfeld, “Parabolic Language,” 199) have noted the juxtaposition of these two images in Judaism (see Jer. 1:10; 24:6; Sir. 49:7; cf. Jesus’ own parables of planting and building). But it is doubtful whether any of this influenced Paul here. The images are common ones; given its greater frequency in his letters, he seems more comfortable with the image of building than that of farming, which probably reflects his urban rather than rural upbringing.

Gk. συνεργός. Cf. 1 Thess. 3:2; 2 Cor. 1:24; 8:23; Phil. 2:25; 4:3; Col. 4:11; Phlm. 1, 24. On the use of this term in Paul, see G. Bertram, TDNT 7:874–75, and Ellis, 5–7. At this point the problem lies not with the meaning of the Greek—it is clearly a possessive—but with putting it into unambiguous English, which is nearly impossible if one keeps the possessive intact; that is, in English “God’s co-workers” can only mean “co-laborers with God,” which is precisely not what Paul’s own possessive intends (see further ). His is a true possessive, meaning God “owns” the co-workers, not that they work “with” God. Thus the English translator must abandon what might seem normal in English for what Paul intended, not “co-laborers with God,” but “co-laborers who both together belong to God.”

At this point one should perhaps also note the difficulty this verb-turned-noun can sometimes present to the ordinary English-speaking reader. Usually (as here) the context itself helps, but one must also read with care, since in some places the English word could go either way (“building” as structure or activity). But here there can be no ambiguity, since Paul goes on to point out that the church in Corinth is “God’s building = structure,” eventually (v. 16) specifying clearly that the structure in this case is nothing other than “God’s temple” in Corinth—the only temple the One and Only God has in this city of many temples to pagan deities.

In an extraordinary moment in the history of English versions, the original NEB translators chose to make this final application serve as the opening sentence to the next paragraph; this was rightly corrected in the REB.

E.g., Godet, 177; Morris, 66; and Ellis, 6; and is almost certainly the only way it would be understood by most readers of the ESV’s “God’s fellow workers,” taken over directly from the RSV, which the NRSV correctly changed to “God’s servants, working together”; this unfortunate misunderstanding is also perpetuated in the NAB and REB.

The “with” came from the συν in συνεργός. Paul’s usage elsewhere makes this a plausible meaning; but here the context is absolutely determinative. See further V. P. Furnish, “Fellow Workers in God’s Service,” JBL 80 (1961), 364–70; cf. J. Shanor (“Paul as Master Builder: Construction Terms in First Corinthians,” NTS 34 [1988], 461–71), an article that was being written at about the same time the first edition of the present commentary appeared.

The τοῦ θεοῦ is missing in P⁴⁶ 0142 81 1962 2495 pc b f vgmss Clement. Metzger (1st ed., 549), argued that “the words were eliminated as repetitious.” Zuntz, 47, on the other hand, argues for an interpolation by the majority on the basis of Pauline style (when referring to “grace” as a particular charism bestowed on an individual [Rom. 12:3; Gal. 2:9], he does not include the genitive). “God” is the implied subject of the passive verb (hence the NIV), so the net result is the same in either case, although Zuntz probably has the better of it in terms of the original text.

D and the MajT have replaced the ἔθηκα with the perfect τέθεικα, thus emphasizing its enduring condition. The original conforms to the aorist in v. 6, and refers to Paul’s founding visit.

P⁴⁶ D 1827 omit the δέ. Zuntz, 189, argues that this is the original, the δέ being a “natural addition.” This, he argues, “adds enormously to the emphasis of Paul’s words.” The clauses would thus punctuate: “. . . as an expert builder. Someone else is building on it: let each one take care.” Although this is persuasively argued, the overwhelming MS evidence on the other side gives good reason to pause.

The original NIV had rendered this “any man,” which was unnecessarily sexist, not to mention not in the Greek text itself.

A “this” is found in most of the evidence from the early versions, as well as in D and the MajT; it came about almost certainly for the same reason it is found in the NIV, which was translated from a text without the τοῦτον (cf. the discussion in Metzger, 483). It is arguable that this rendering deflects Paul’s emphasis here, which is now no longer on the foundation itself but the superstructure.

On the variants χρυσόν/χρυσίον, ἄργυρον/ἀργύριον see Zuntz, 133, 209. χρυσόν and ἄργυρον are to be preferred.

A large number of MSS omit this αὐτό (incl. P⁴⁶ D latt Maj), most likely because it looks like an unnecessary intrusion. See Zuntz, 132; cf. Metzger, 483–84. An “addition” in this case almost certainly would have followed the verb. It is also possible that Paul intended the intensive “the fire itself,” but as Conzelmann, 71 n. 19, points out, one cannot see why, since there is no emphasis on fire in the passage.

Gk. ἄλλος once (v. 10); οὐδείς once (v. 11); ἕκαστος three times (vv. 10, 13 [2x]); τις three times (vv. 12, 14, 15).

C. W. Fishburne (“I Corinthians III.10–15 and the Testament of Abraham,” NTS 17 [1969/70], 109–15) suggests that the central point of this analogy is the same as that of vv. 5–9, but that Paul also issues a warning along the way (see 109 and 114). This seems to miss rather widely both the reason for the change of metaphors and the urgency of the present paragraph.

A perspective that was still expressed, e.g., in the popular expositions by Barclay, Prior, and MacArthur, even though all the contextual evidence is against it.

For a succinct but helpful expression of the position taken here, cf. K. Donfried, “Justification and Last Judgment in Paul,” Int 30 (1976), 148–49.

As with the preceding analogy, this is a common one in antiquity, ready at hand for Paul’s own adaptation. See, e.g., Epict. 2.15.8 (“Do you not wish to make your beginning and your foundation [θεμέλιον] firm . . . and only after you have done that proceed to rear thereon [ἐποικοδομεῖν] the structure of your determination?” Loeb, 1:317); and Philo, somn. 2.8 (“So much by way of a foundation [θεμελίων]. As we go on to build the superstructure [ἐποικοδομῶμεν] let us follow the directions of Allegory, that wise Master-builder [σοφῆς ἀρχιτέκτονος]” Loeb, 5:445, 447). Cf. further Philo, gig. 30; mut.nom. 211; Plutarch, Fort.Rom. 320b.

As argued below, the fourth particular changes from Apollos to those in Corinth responsible for promoting “wisdom.”

Gk. οἰκοδομή; used also as an analogy for the church in Eph. 2:21. The Greek word has the same noun/verb ambiguity that one finds in the English word “building,” which can refer either to the finished product or to the process. In v. 9 it refers to the church as the “structure,” which is then specified in v. 16 as the temple of God. In vv. 10–15 the emphasis lies on the process of “building” the building (the verb ἐποικοδομέω is repeated four times). Elsewhere in 1 Corinthians the simple verb (οἰκοδομέω) and the noun οἰκοδομή are used for the concept of “building up, edifying” the church (1 Cor. 8:1, 10; 10:23; 14:3–5, 12, 17, 26).

Here is another early indication in the Pauline corpus, along with the earlier usage in 2 Thess 1:12 and 2:16 (see my comm. on these letters in this series, 17–18), that this word carries a bit broader sense than that frequently attributed to Paul by many within the Protestant tradition, based primarily on his special emphasis on this word in both Galatians and Romans. See further the discussion in J. Vadakkedom, “ ‘According to the Grace of God Given to Me’ (1 Cor 3,10),” BiBh 28 (2002), 374–90.

The original NIV, understandably but also unfortunately, rendered Paul’s σοφός here as “expert,” thus missing his continuing play on the language of “wisdom” throughout the passage. While in other contexts this would have been an otherwise excellent “dynamic equivalent,” in this case it unfortunately tended to take the English-speaking reader into a quite different direction from Paul’s own reason for the word here.

Gk. ἀρχιτέκτων, a word that, as the papyrus and inscriptional evidence put forward in MM indicates, refers not simply to a “carpenter,” τέκτων, but to the one who serves as both architect and chief engineer. Hence the rendering “master-builder” in many modern translations (RSV, NAB, NASB, NEB). The word is also found in Isa. 3:3 (LXX); cf. Philo, somn. 2.8.

A point missed by the otherwise adequate rendering of the NIV.

Cf. Munck (Paul, 150–51): “Paul therefore does not contrast himself with the other Christian leaders who have performed a task in Corinth after him. . . . [Rather], the Corinthians and the apostle are contrasted with each other. The apostle has laid the proper foundation, . . . but it is of decisive importance how the Corinthians continue to build on it.” Among the commentaries, see Goudge, R-P, Parry, Holladay, O-W, although the latter mysteriously miss the specific context of chaps. 1–4.

This is a common view; cf., e.g., Lightfoot, Weiss, Lietzmann, Mare. Grosheide, Senft, and others see it as a more general description of any and all who followed Paul in Corinth.

See . Among commentators it is given a favorable hearing by Moffatt, Craig, Barrett, and Bruce.

Even the γάρ (“for”) that joins the clause to v. 10 is less easy to account for. It undoubtedly has in the first instance a causal relationship to the last clause of v. 10 (line B′); but in terms of the analogy proper that does not follow, since the point of the warning is “building upon” the foundation, not the laying of the foundation itself. Its function, therefore, must be to point forward to the rest of the analogy as it is elaborated in v. 12, and thus the emphasis is on “Jesus Christ.”

Some have seen this sentence as an allusion to Peter (see ), in light of the logion in Matt. 16:18, that “on this rock will I build my church,” which it is argued was the perspective being promoted by the so-called Cephas-party. But not only does this make the unwarranted assumption that a logion peculiar to Matthew’s gospel would have been known in a Pauline church, but it also implies that the foundation has to do with personalities (Paul, Peter, etc.) rather than with the gospel vis-à-vis sophia, which seems to be more in keeping with the context of the argument as a whole.

Gk. παρὰ τὸν κείμενον. The παρά here is comparative, following ἄλλος (BDAG C3). The present τὸν κείμενον probably implies something like “the one already in place.” Cf. Barrett, 87.

Suggested at times in commentaries. See, e.g., Mare, 207.

The conditional sentence here is almost certainly a particular, not a general, supposition, and should be so translated. Paul’s concern is not with what at any time might occur “if ever anyone builds,” but with what is actually, or presumably, going on in Corinth at the present time. On this matter see Burton, Moods, 101. It is not that the gnomic sense of the NIV (and most English translations) is not true; it is simply not Paul’s present concern.

BDF #461 (241).

This exegetical reality in itself tends to call into serious question any number of both “interpretations” and “applications” of this passage; as, e.g., J. E. Rosscup’s “A New Look at 1 Corinthians 3:12—‘Gold, Silver, Precious Stones,’ ” MSJ 1 (1990), 33–51, who suggests that the last three items point to a “diminish[ing] degree of one’s reward.” Paul would surely be interested to have known that himself(!), since his own point is not diminishing degree of reward but the loss of the product altogether. And at that point all attempts to draw specific applications should cease, precluding, e.g., Collins’s comment (151) that “the variety . . . suggest[s] that the various members of the community have distinctive contributions to make.” This, too, pastoral as it sounds, simply goes another step beyond Paul’s own current concerns. Much more likely this kind of imagery is just that—imagery. At issue is the “what” that is being “imaged,” which in this case seems clearly to be not that the worker’s own relationship to the Lord is at stake, but that what the worker has “accomplished” counts for almost nothing, having used the wrong “stuff” with which to build.

It is simply to press the analogy too hard to say, e.g., as does Gromacki (48): “Since the foundation is a person, then the materials must also be persons.” That may seem logical, but it scarcely recognizes the nature and function of metaphor. Furthermore, when that interpretation is pressed, it creates some strange conclusions for vv. 14–15.

They occur in various combinations: “gold and silver” frequently (cf. Hag. 2:8), as in 1 Chr. 22:14, 16, which also mentions “stones,” but not “precious stones”; 1 Chr. 29:2 has “gold, silver, and fine stone”; 2 Chr. 3:6 has “gold and precious stones.”

This is the language of Conzelmann, 76. Again he is too enamored by Greek sources; the context and Paul’s own Jewish background are determinative here.

This also determines the debate over λίθους τιμίους, whether this plural means building stones as such (e.g., marble) or the precious gems that adorn the temple. The LXX uses this combination in the singular to refer to costly construction stones (e.g., 1 Chr. 29:2, “all kinds of fine stone and marble”), but the plural in 2 Chr. 3:6 for adorning the temple “with precious stones” (= gems).

This type of conditional sentence is of the same category as “If you stand out in the rain, you will get wet.” No surprises, just common sense. If the one condition prevails, then the other is inevitable.

The word for the building process, ἔργον (“work”), carries the same ambiguity as the word “building” (see ). The word often appears in Paul to denote what he and others do in serving Christ and the gospel (e.g., 1 Thess. 5:13; 1 Cor. 9:1; 15:58; 16:10; Rom. 15:18; Phil. 2:30); cf. κόπος and κοπɩάω. In this case ἔργον means something close to “workmanship,” with a view esp. to the final product of the working process (cf. H. W. Hollander, “Revelation by Fire: 1 Corinthians 3.13,” BibTrans 44 [1993], 242–44; and the more extensive article in NTS 40 [1994], 89–104); see further the possible connection between this passage and 1 Enoch 50 in R. Herms, “ ‘Being Saved without Honor’: A Conceptual Link between 1 Corinthians 3 and 1 Enoch 50?” JSNT 29 (2006), 187–210.

Gk. φανερὸν γενήσεται; the two other occurrences of this combination in 1 Corinthians (11:19; 14:25) imply the revealing in the present (by the Spirit) of what has been hidden; the usage here is eschatological, as the rest of the paragraph makes plain.

Fishburne, “I Corinthians III.10–15,” has argued that Paul is dependent on the Testament of Abraham 13. The crucial point of the argument, of course, is the dating and provenance of the Testament. On this matter he is less than convincing and has overlooked some crucial sources that point in the other direction. See E. P. Sanders, “Testament of Abraham,” in OTP, 1:871–80.

Cf. 1:8. Paul has various expressions for this “Day.” For him it involves the Parousia, the resurrection, and judgment. Hence it is above all “the day of the Lord” (1 Thess. 5:2 [cf. v. 4!]; 2 Thess. 2:2; 1 Cor. 5:5), which OT term he transformed into “the day of our Lord Jesus (Christ)” (1:8; 2 Cor. 1:14; Phil. 1:6, 10; 2:16). Although there is no distinction in these terms as to what aspect of the future Paul is emphasizing, that of judgment tends to dominate. See G. Delling, TDNT 2:943–53; cf. H. Ridderbos, Paul, 551–62; G. Vos, The Pauline Eschatology (Grand Rapids, 1961), 261–87.

Some (e.g., Parry, Collins; H. W. Hollander, “The Testing by Fire of the Builders’ Works: 1 Corinthians 3.10–15,” NTS 40 [1994], 89–103) take τὸ ἔργον to be the subject, but this seems to miss both the grammar and the distinct flow of Paul’s thought here.

Taking the verb to be a middle (as Grosheide), rather than a passive. The alternative, expressed by R-P, is to translate “The day is (to be) revealed in fire,” expressing “a common use of the present tense, to indicate that a coming event is so certain that it may be spoken of as already here” (63).

Paul himself uses it in apocalyptic fashion in 2 Thess. 1:8. For the biblical use of the metaphor for judgment, see TDNT 6:928–52 (F. Lang).

On this matter, and others in this paragraph, see H. Preisker and E. Würthwein, TDNT 4:695–728.

See further Donfried, “Justification,” 140–52.

However, cf. 4:5, where the final verdict is to “receive praise from God.” What more reward, one wonders in the context of bounteous grace, could one desire than the pronouncement of “Well done, good and faithful servant” by the Master (Matt. 25:21, 23)? Even here, however, there is the implication of something more.

The verb ζημιωθήσεται can mean either “to be punished” (the choice of BDAG) or “suffer loss or damage.” All other occurrences in the NT carry the second meaning, including Paul in 2 Cor. 7:9 and Phil. 3:8. Since the context, and esp. the stylistic feature of antithetic parallels, also favor this meaning, one is hard-pressed to find any good reason for the former meaning here. Parry, 67, translates “he will be fined,” keeping the metaphor of “work” and “pay” (cf. Lightfoot, followed inter alios by R-P and Barrett, “mulcted of his pay”). But that emphasizes the wrong aspect of the metaphor, which is not “work,” but the “fire” of judgment.

So also J. R. Busto Saiz, “¿Se salvará como atravesando fuego? 1 Cor 3,15b reconsiderado,” EstEcl 68 (1993), 333–38, whose article is directed against a misunderstanding that arises in the Spanish translation, but not so in English.

Chrysostom, hom. 9 in 1 Cor., argues that this means that he will be preserved in the fire of hell, so that he will not experience annihilation. But this was to preserve his own prior understanding of the analogy. The verb σώζω in this context will not sustain a nonsoteriological meaning.

This understanding of the text goes back at least as far as Origen. For the full discussion of the patristic data, see J. Gnilka, Ist I Cor. 3,10–15 ein Schriftzeugnis für das Fegfeuer? Eine exegetisch-historische Untersuchung (Düsseldorf, 1955). He answers his question (“Is 1 Cor. 3:10–15 a scriptural witness to the doctrine of purgatory?”) with a No; it simply cannot be exegetically sustained. A more modern expression of the traditional point of view may be found in B. Bartmann, Purgatory (ET, London, 1936).

The Greek construction οὕτως δέ ὡς makes this certain: “thus, as it were, only through fire.”

Cf. Zech 3:2, and the English proverb “saved by the skin of one’s teeth.” For Greek and Roman parallels, see Weiss, 83 n. 1. More recently R. Herms has shown some interesting correspondences with (and significant differences from) a somewhat similar passage in 1 Enoch 50:1–5 (“ ‘Being Saved without Honor’: A Conceptual Link between 1 Corinthians 3 and 1 Enoch 50?” JSNT 29 [2006], 187–210).

Donfried, “Justification,” 149, and most commentators. J. T. Townsend doubts the “figure of speech” interpretation in favor of Paul’s having been a former Shammaite, who in this passage reflects their belief, described in Bar.Ros.Hash. 16b–17a, that such people “will pass through hell fire before their final salvation” (see “1 Corinthians 3:15 and the School of Shammai,” HTR 61 [1968], 500–504). But the differences, which Townsend slights, between v. 15 and the Shammaites are so great as to preclude indebtedness.

“Influenced by the preceding word, several witnesses, chiefly Western, read the present tense φθείρει (Dgr Ggr L P 81 [pc]) instead of φθερεῖ” (Metzger, 484).

In an article roughly contemporary with the first edition of this commentary, J. Shanor demonstrated rather conclusively that the language Paul used in this passage corresponds to a 4th c. B.C. inscription regarding a temple in Mesopotamia (“Paul as Master Builder: Construction Terms in First Corinthians,” NTS 34 [1988], 461–71).

Here, plus 5:6; 6:2, 3, 9, 15, 16, 19; 9:13, 24; the outburst of six of them in chap. 6 indicates something as to the level of his frustration with them at that point.

Given their own emphasis on wisdom and knowledge, this may be more than simply a rhetorical device here, moving closer to irony or sarcasm: “Can it be that you who boast in γνῶσις do not know that?”

Some have suggested that Paul’s question implies that Paul had previously given them this image. See, e.g., Weiss, 84; B. Gärtner, The Temple and the Community in Qumran and the New Testament (SNTSMS 1; Cambridge, 1965), 57. But that is to put too much weight on the language of what seems rather to be a rhetorical device in this letter.

J. M. Ford, “You Are God’s ‘Sukkah’ (I Cor. iii.10–17),” NTS 21 (1973/74), 139–42, argues that the imagery here is that of building the “tabernacle” during the Feast of Tabernacles. But the alleged parallels are so remote and the temple imagery in Paul so fixed that this was destined to be an item of curiosity only.

See O. Michel in TDNT 4:880–90. The distinctions between the two words do not necessarily hold in all the Greek of the NT period, but the usage in the LXX, where the distinction is common, seems to have influenced Paul here. One should perhaps note further here that passages like this one make it clear that Paul did not stand in opposition to his Jewish heritage. Rather, he saw Christ as the fulfillment of that heritage in every possible way. On this cf. A. L. A. Hogeterp, “Paul’s Judaism Reconsidered: The Issue of Cultic Imagery in the Corinthian Correspondence,” ETL 81 (2005), 87–108.

Cf., e.g., Ps. 114:2: “Judah became his sanctuary,” plus the rich imagery of God’s dwelling in their midst in the desert.

This suggestion has been frequently made, and it is probably correct, given the Qumran eschatological parallels (see Gärtner, Temple) and Paul’s overall eschatological frame of reference; but nothing in Paul’s usage itself demands such an understanding. See, among others, Weiss, Barrett, Bruce, Conzelmann, Senft.

E.g., Isa. 28:16 (cf. 1 Cor. 3:10); Ezek. 40–48; Jub. 1:17; 1 Enoch 91:13; 4QFlor.

As represented in the charges of the false witnesses in Mark 14:58. The “falseness” does not have to do with the statement, but with what would have been meant by it. The same tradition is reflected in John 2:19–21, and probably among the Hellenists in Acts (whence arose Paul), who rejected the temple in Jerusalem as “made with hands” (Acts 6:13; 7:48–50).

Although one perhaps should not make too much of it, Paul’s word order, ναὸς θεοῦ ἐστε, is probably both emphatic and an illustration of “Colwell’s rule” (that predicate nouns that precede the verb are usually definite, even if they do not have the definite article). If so, then Paul is saying, “Do you not know that you are the temple of God in Corinth?”

This has now been acknowledged by almost all interpreters, which is also what makes the continued rendering of this phrase as “in you” in several contemporary English translations (NRSV, NAB, ESV) so difficult to comprehend. Since Paul’s ἐν ὑμῖν can only mean “in your midst,” not “in you individually,” as all interpreters acknowledge, why continue to confuse the reader by saying it poorly in English? Translation, after all, is supposed to put into English what the Greek means!

What cannot be known from this distance is the nature of the dwelling Paul assumes here. The two basic options are (1) what today would be described as “apartments” that served as the second “floor” above the shops that opened onto the street (still in evidence in the ruins at Ostia), or (2) the villas of the wealthy whose atria could often house a much larger group. Garland’s description of them as “cramped, diminutive house churches” (120) assumes far more than can be known in fact.

As in vv. 12–13, this is almost certainly a present particular supposition: “If anyone is, or keeps on, destroying. . . .”

“Sätze Heiligen Rechts im Neuen Testament,” NTS 1 (1954/55), 248–60; ET, New Testament Questions of Today (Philadelphia, 1969), 66–81, esp. 66–68. But see the critique by D. E. Aune, Prophecy in Early Christianity and the Ancient Mediterranean World (Grand Rapids, 1983), 167, 237.

Note esp. the near wordplay brought about by the juxtaposition of the two verbs: φθείρει/φθερεῖ (“If anyone the temple of God destroys, destroy this person will God”).

According to BDAG, the imagery is that of “the destruction of a house.”

On this question R-P are worth quoting in full: “But . . . φθερεῖ here . . . must [not] be pressed to mean annihilation (see on v. 5). Nor, on the other hand, must it be watered down to mean mere physical punishment (cf. xi.30). The exact meaning is nowhere revealed in Scripture; but terrible ruin and eternal loss of some kind seems to be meant” (67). Cf. BDAG and G. Harder, TDNT 9:93–106.

Cf. Käsemann, Questions, 68; cf. C. J. Roetzel, “The Judgment Form in Paul’s Letters,” JBL 88 (1969), 305.

So, e.g., Godet, MacArthur, and Barrett (to a lesser extent).

The theological question as to whether a true “believer” could be destroyed by God lies beyond Paul’s present concern. In any case, one must be careful not to let the “logic” of one’s system (as in the case of MacArthur, 86) prejudge the plain meaning of Paul’s words. That these people were members of the Corinthian community seems beyond reasonable doubt; that Paul is also serving up a genuine threat of eternal punishment seems also the plain sense of the text. The theological resolution of such tension will lie either with the concept of the visible church being composed of more than the real church, destined by God for glory, or with the supposition that some, who by all appearances do belong to the community of faith, have, for reasons beyond our understanding, opted out and are once again pursuing a path leading to destruction. The net result is the same in either case. Paul does not consider any of the Corinthian “bent ones” to be there—yet; and the warning is intended to keep it from happening.

Gk. ἅγιος, “holy.”

This translation reflects what is most likely the correct understanding of a very difficult Greek construction, οἵτινές ἐστε ὑμεῖς. The plural compound relative pronoun οἵτινες does not have a proper antecedent, and can refer either to “temple” or “holy.” The reason for the plural is attraction to the following ὑμεῖς (cf. Phil. 1:28; 1 Tim. 3:15). The antecedent is most likely “temple,” which rounds off the sentence by referring again to v. 16. To emphasize that “holy” is what they in fact are seems to ask too much of the context.

Cf. Käsemann, Questions, 68.

The Greek is singular here (“Let no one deceive oneself”), which is picked up in the current NIV in the next clause, “If any of you. . . .”

See . The final part of the problem, which is also the most sensitive one, namely their attitude toward Paul himself, is finally addressed in chap. 4.

Gk. ἐξαπατάτω, a Pauline word in the NT (2 Thess. 2:3; 2 Cor. 11:3; Rom. 7:11; 16:18; 1 Tim. 2:14). Cf. the μὴ πλανᾶσθε in 6:9 and 15:33.

This kind of warning further indicates that the problem in Corinth had not yet been the work of outsiders. There is no hint in this letter that they are being deceived by someone from the outside. In Gal. 3:1 and 2 Cor. 11:2–3, on the other hand, the work of outsiders has deceived God’s people.

8:2; 11:16; 14:37; cf. Gal. 6:3; Phil. 3:4. In each case the formula introduces a position actually held by his “opponents” and thus functions as a form of irony to dissuade them, or to get them to hear his argument on the other side.

Note again the interchange of αἰών and κόσμος, just as in 1:20 (q.v.).

The only direct citation of Job in the NT (cf. Rom. 11:35). Even though these are the words of Eliphaz, they are the common assumption of all the “players” in the book of Job, which is what makes the dialogue possible, and in Eliphaz’s case also reflects the divine irony. This much of his speech at least is true!

The two texts together serve as a good place to observe Paul’s use of the OT. The citation of Job is closer to the Hebrew than to the LXX. Paul seems to be translating on his own, although the word πανουργίᾳ reflects v. 12 of the LXX. The citation of the psalm is exactly as in the LXX, except for the exchange of the crucial word σόφος for ἄνθρωπος. This is probably an example of Paul’s appeal to Scripture being at the same time an interpretation of it (cf. Eph. 4:8). See Ellis, Use, 144; and A. M. Harmon, “Aspects of Paul’s Use of the Psalms,” WTJ 32 (1969), 22. The sense is exactly that of the psalm.

Cf. NEB: “He traps the wise in their own cunning” (cf. GNB).

Gk. διαλογισμούς, which refers to human machinations more than simply “thoughts.”

Gk. γάρ, causal or explanatory in this case. Cf. NRSV, NASB, NEB, Moffatt; the NAB handles this with a colon (“. . . the future: all belong to you”)

This is the only other mention of “Cephas” in the entire section. This means either that he is less important (the position adopted in this comm.) or that the silence elsewhere is an indirect way of indicating that his “faction” is more serious, which seems less likely. See on 1:12 () and 3:11.

Except the continuing expression of death itself. This is the point of 15:23–28. When this final enemy is subdued, then comes the End, when all is turned over to the Father.

These last two also form pairs in the similar listing in Rom. 8:38, where nothing can separate God’s people from his love as it is given to them in Christ Jesus.

The language is Barrett’s. Cf. JB, which tries to capture this sense of the passage, as well as to tie it to vv. 5–9, by translating: “Paul, Apollos, Cephas, the world, life and death, the present and the future, are all your servants.”

The two δέ’s in this and the next clause are consecutive, not adversative, and thus correctly translated “and.”

The language “all things are yours” is identical to statements among the Stoics, but its point for them was that they were thereby αὐτάρκης, “self-sufficient.” See, e.g., Seneca, benef. 7.2.5; 7.3.2; 7.4.1; Diog. L., Vit. 7.125; Cicero, Fin. 3.22.75–76. On this matter see Weiss, 90–91, and esp. H. Braun, “Exegetische Randglossen zum I Korintherbrief,” in Gesammelte Studien zum Neuen Testament und seiner Umwelt (Tübingen, 1967), 182–86. Paul’s own radically different meaning for the phrase is another clear indication that finding the “source” of his language is not always significant, since his “in Christ” existence so thoroughly transforms everything, even the language he uses, and gives it new meaning.

Some would divide the early part of the letter into three somewhat coordinate sections, 1:18–2:5, 2:6–3:4, and 3:5–4:5, but that misses the apologetic thrust of the argument almost completely, which seems to mitigate such an arrangement. See, e.g., B. Fiore, “ ‘Covert Allusion’ in 1 Corinthians 1–4,” CBQ 47 (1985), 85–102. For the possible connection of this passage to Greco-Roman rhetoric, see Witherington, 136–37.

Garland (125) makes this connection all the more clear by including this paragraph with his analysis of 3:18–23.

Several significant MSS (P⁴⁶ A C D F G P 6 33 1739 1881 pc) read ζητεῖτε for ζητεῖται. This is doubly complex: on the one hand it may simply be an itacism (the ε/αι interchange is frequent in the earlier centuries); on the other hand, if the second plural were actually intended, was it indicative or imperative (probably the former = “Now then you seek in stewards, etc.”)? In either case, the second plural is probably secondary.

This is one of the truly difficult words to render into English in a context like this, since “spirituality” in English, in every form of dictionary definition, does not mean what is intended here and can only be intended when one is referring to Paul’s usage—not some fuzzy notion of being “religious” or “devotional,” but an adjective referring to the work/effect of the Spirit in a believer’s life. Hence the capitalization, to call attention to the fact that Paul’s present discussion has to do with a believer’s life in the Spirit, not with the “fuzziness” that all too often accompanies, or is associated with, the English word “spiritual.” (I recall a family member once referring to a woman as “so spiritual,” by which was meant a woman who carried an aura of “spirituality” with her, which she truly did; but in this case there was no intended direct reference to the Holy Spirit at all. It was then that I realized that what was intended by this usage, and what most other believers ordinarily intend, is something quite different from Paul’s usage of πνευματικός in this letter, where in every case, it is an adjective referring to what the Spirit is about. Thus “spiritual” is no longer an English equivalent at all, and instead is probably seriously misleading.)

It has become common in more recent times to downplay, or reject altogether, the apologia nature of this paragraph (e.g., M. Mitchell, Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation: An Exegetical Investigation of the Language and Composition of 1 Corinthians [Louisville, 1991], 54–55). But that seems to miss the nature of this argumentation by too much. See esp. the critique in J. K. Hwang, “Mimesis, Apostolic Parousia, and Church Discipline: An Apologetic-Mimetic Interpretation of 1 Corinthians 4 and 5” (Ph.D. dissertation, Fuller Seminary, 2009), 62–65.

Paul has οὕτως (“thus”), which is correlative with the ὡς (“as”) that follows (cf. 3:15; 9:26) = “this then . . . namely in what follows . . . is how you ought to regard us.” There are plenty of examples of οὕτως referring to what precedes, but in such cases it is used absolutely (cf., e.g., 8:12). Conzelmann, 82 n. 1, shared the view of the original NIV, but to do so had to disregard οὕτως . . . ὡς as correlative. He saw the οὕτως as pointing backward, and the ὡς as object of the verb λογιζέσθω.

Gk. ἄνθρωπος, used here as a form of the indefinite pronoun (see BDAG 4aγ), and thus (legitimately) turned into a second person pronoun in the current NIV. By doing so the translators have made Paul’s (certainly intended) application direct, that “people” here means you Corinthians!

Even though Paul reverts to the first plurals in vv. 8–13, the very direct application of that picture to himself personally, with the attendant appeal that they also be like him, indicates that even there the emphasis is not on apostleship in general but on his own apostleship in particular.

This word originated to describe the slaves who rowed in the lower tier of a trireme. Eventually it came to be used of any who were in a subservient position, with emphasis on the relationship of one who served a superior. K. H. Rengstorf, TDNT 8:542, seems to miss the context of the argument considerably in suggesting that the word comes very close to ἀπόστολος here. That is to capture the “authority” motif without catching the real point of the imagery, servanthood.

The word came to have a much broader range, referring to any person in a position of trust, but accountable to others. On the pre-Christian use of the term, see J. Reumann, “ ‘Servants of God’—Pre-Christian Religious Application of ΟΙΚΟΝΟΜΟΣ in Greek,” JBL 77 (1958), 339–49; for Pauline usage see idem, “Οἰκονομία-Terms in Paul in Comparison with Lucan Heilsgeschichte,” NTS 13 (1966/67), 147–67; cf. more recently, J. Byron, “Slave of Christ or Willing Servant? Paul’s Self-description in 1 Corinthians 4:1–2 and 9:16–18,” Neotestamentica 37 (2003), 179–98; cf. Thiselton (336), who renders it “estate manager.”

With this word (μυστήριον [see for its nonappearance in 2:1]), the English translator comes to one of the truly difficult Greek words to put into understandable English. Since the English word “mystery” is a direct borrowing from the Greek word itself, rendering it as such has the appearance of a logical choice. Unfortunately, μυστήριον in Greek and the borrowed word “mystery” in English have probably less than a 50 percent overlap in meaning. The Greek word when used by Paul ordinarily refers to something that was at one time “hidden in God” but that has now been manifest in Christ and through the Spirit; thus it is no longer “hidden” to those who have the Spirit, nor therefore (above all) is it any longer hidden at all. Paul’s point in almost every case is that what was “once hidden” has now through Christ and the Spirit been made plain for those who live in/by the Spirit. The problem for all English translators is to find an English equivalent that can properly carry all of that; and whatever else, “mystery” on its own simply cannot do it. But what to use instead is the problem, which unfortunately no one has yet successfully resolved; the use of “secrets” in some versions (NEB, REB) leads the English-speaking reader even further from Paul’s intent.

Perhaps the best illustration of the meaning of Paul’s word was a kind of puzzle common to my younger days, where a well-known person’s face or other object was clearly outlined, but otherwise “hidden,” in a puzzle that basically was a picture frame with thousands of little dots. Once one could actually see the “face” or the “ship” in the dots, it was no longer possible ever to view the dots and not at the same time see the “hidden” object. So it is with Paul’s usage of this word; what was once hidden from ordinary view, once perceived by means of the Spirit, can no longer remain hidden; it is thereafter always “in view,” as it were.

In the two instances in chaps. 12–14, in the context of Spirit gifting, it almost certainly refers to special revelation(s) given by the Spirit. The present context requires that the revelation is in view (cf. Conzelmann, 83).

This point is made esp. by A. E. Harvey, “The Use of Mystery Language in the Bible,” JTS, n.s., 31 (1980), 331–32.

See the references to Brown and Bornkamm on .

The suggestion of some that it means “dispenser of the sacraments” is so far removed from both the literary and historical context as not to need refutation.

Gk. ὧδε λοιπόν (lit. “here, in addition”).

BDAG, λοιπόν, 3b; cf. Moule, 161: “on that showing (ὧδε, referring back to the preceding verse where the apostles have been called stewards) it follows that (λοιπόν) what is looked for in stewards is that . . .” (cf. Parry, 74). For a complete discussion, see M. E. Thrall, Greek Particles in the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1962), 26–28.

Gk. ζητεῖται, which in cases like this can move over to the sense of “required” (BDAG 4; NIV, Barrett, Conzelmann). The sense seems proverbial.

According to Turner, Syntax, 265, this ἐν functions as a dative of reference.

This ἵνα-clause is epexegetic, not final, functioning as the object of the verb “to seek.”

Ellis, 46, suggests on the basis of his interpretation of 2:6–16 that this “examination” of Paul does “not represent an opposition”; rather, the Corinthians “only wish to subject Paul to the testing usually given to a fellow pneumatic.” But see .

Gk. ἐμοὶ δὲ εἰς ἐλάχιστόν ἐστιν; on the idiom see BDAG, εἰμι, 2cβ.

On this usage see BDAG, ἡμέρα, 3bβ.

A difficult γάρ joins this clause to the preceding one, rendered literally in the ESV, but thereby making very little sense. The NEB takes it as somewhat causal (“Why [ἀλλ’, v. 3b], I do not even pass judgement on myself, for I have nothing on my conscience”), but that seems to miss the force of the three clauses together. More likely this is an illustration of γάρ having the force of δέ, which BDAG 3 calls “a marker of inference”; cf. Zerwick, BG, 473.

The sentence must be kept in this context. To make it a general statement about his interior life simply goes beyond the present concern.

Lit. “I know nothing with myself.” The verb σύνοιδα, found only here and in Acts 5:2 in the NT, is the root from which comes the word συνείδησις, “conscience” (see on 8:7).

Gk. ἐν τούτῳ; a causal usage: “on this account,” or “because of this.” See Moule, 51.

Gk. δεδικαίωμαι; the first occurrence of this verb in the extant Pauline letters. Its only other occurrence in 1 Corinthians is in 6:11, where it has its well-known theological meaning of right standing with God. Although it is used here in keeping with the metaphor, it does not necessarily lose its theological flavor altogether. Nonetheless, the emphasis here is on the final judgment, not on a judgment previously carried out through Christ’s death.

The noun κύριος does not have the article, but this is a clear case of Colwell’s rule (see on 3:17), where a definite predicate noun that precedes the verb does not need the definite article.

Holladay, 60, thinks otherwise, that it refers to God, who is mentioned at the end of v. 5. But ordinary Pauline usage (“Lord” used absolutely almost always refers to Christ) and the language “the Lord comes” in v. 5, which refers exclusively to Christ, seem determinative.

Gk. ὥστε. See on 3:7 and 21a, properly translated “therefore” in the NIV.

On this usage, see Turner, Syntax, 76. Cf. the translation by Williams: “So you must stop forming. . . .”

The verb has now changed to κρίνω. It will change again to διακρίνω in v. 7. This same play on κρίνω words occurs again in 11:27–34, and is nearly impossible to reproduce in English.

Gk. πρὸ καιροῦ (cf. Matt. 8:29); this could possibly mean “ahead of time” = “too early” (cf. NEB, Phillips, “premature”), but the next clause, which defines the “time” intended, indicates that Paul means the appointed time (= the Day) of judgment.

Gk. ἕως ἄν, which means “that the commencement of an event is dependent on circumstances” (BDAG 1aβ). The circumstance here is the coming of the Lord, which thereby defines the “appointed time.”

On the possibility that this is what Paul means by “reward,” see also on 3:14.

It is axiomatic in Judaism that God knows and searches human hearts. See, e.g., 1 Sam. 16:7; 1 Chr. 28:9; Ps. 139:1, 11–12; Jer. 17:10; Matt. 6:4, 6, 18; Heb. 4:12–13; Sir. 1:30; Midr.Ps. 14:1; Bar.Sota 3a; Jos. War 5.413. Cf. Paul himself in 14:25; 1 Thess. 2:4; 2 Cor. 4:2–4; Rom. 2:16.

This is a piece of typical Semitic poetry, in the form of synonymous parallelism. Therefore, one must be careful of “overexegeting” the two lines. In such poetry a single reality is being expressed, even though the two lines say it in slightly different ways.

Turner, Insights, 131–32, argues that it is “not the things that darkness hides,” but “the concealing darkness itself” that is brought to light. His concern is well taken, that the very darkness that allows the Corinthians their misjudgments needs to be destroyed at Christ’s coming. Nonetheless, this concept is so common in Jewish antiquity that it seems overly subtle to suggest that Paul intended something other than bringing to light “the things that darkness hides.” Cf. Barrett, 103.

The Syriac versions and the MajT add φρονεῖν after γέγραπται; thus the KJV’s “not to think of men above that which was written.” Not only does this lack any early support, but there is no way to explain its universal early omission if it were original. Here is a clear case of “the more difficult” reading being the original.

The MajT has added a ὅτι here for the sake of improving Paul’s Greek: δοκέω followed by an indicative ordinarily prefers the expressed “that”; so does English, hence the “that” in most English versions.

P⁶⁸ B D F G Ψ Maj read the more common βλασφημούμενοι for the much rarer δυσφημούμενοι of P⁴⁶ * A C P 33 81 1175 1506 pc. Again, the more difficult reading is to be preferred.

From Charles W. Sheldon, In His Steps.

Morna Hooker suggests otherwise: “that the first will refer to the basic trouble which has given rise to the situation described in the second” (“ ‘Beyond the Things Which Are Written’: An Examination of I Cor. iv.6,” NTS 10 [1963/64], 128). But the rest of the argument puts the focus on the second clause. Vv. 7–13 take up the matter of “pride” and vv. 18–21 speak to their arrogance against Paul in particular.

What is less clear, and in fact cannot be decided, is whether the second ἵνα-clause is coordinate with the first and thus dependent on the verb μετεσχημάτισα or subordinate to μάθητε as an object clause, giving the content of what they should have learned. The latter is probably to be preferred, but the former cannot be ruled out. In either case the net result is the same: it all points to the final clause as the ultimate concern.

For these two prepositions having to do with “for and against,” see BDAG on ὑπέρ (A1aδ) and κατά (A1b).

For reasons no longer clear, the original NIV rendered this phrase “take pride in one over against another,” which thus generalizes what is here esp. case-specific. The “one” in this case was clearly Apollos, the “other” Paul. For Goulder’s attempt to resurrect Baur at this point, see .

Otherwise Barrett, 106, following T. W. Manson (see ). He suggests: “Paul means that he has made the argument of the last few paragraphs . . . look as if it applied (or applied only) to himself and Apollos.” The rest of the sentence, esp. the “for the one, against the other,” makes this view difficult to sustain. See .

Gk. μετασχηματίζω (cf. 2 Cor. 11:13–15; Phil. 3:21). This definition is from Field, Notes, 169. For the most thorough discussions of the verb, see F. H. Colson, “Μετεσχημάτισα in I Cor. iv 6,” JTS 17 (1916), 379–84, and Hooker ( above).

Cf. .

Fiore (“Covert Allusion,” 94–95) renews the suggestion that ταῦτα refers to Paul and Apollos, who “become figures themselves, to which the community is to look for their own improvement.” This study, which is otherwise a very helpful analysis of the use of “indirect speech” as a rhetorical device in antiquity, is seriously marred by its failure to recognize the apologetic element in chap. 4.

This meaning is solidly attested in the noncompounded form of the verb σχηματίζω, putting emphasis on the word σχῆμα. See the discussion by Hooker and Colson (); cf. BDAG. For a discussion of the noncompounded form as referring to “indirect speech” in rhetoric, see Fiore, “Covert Allusion,” 88–93.

The phrase has continued to receive a considerable amount of scholarly attention since the first edition of this commentary. See, e.g., L. L. Welborn, “A Conciliatory Principle in 1 Cor. 4:6,” NovT 29 (1987), 320–46; D. R. Hall, “A Disguise for the Wise: ΜΕΤΑΣΧΗΜΑΤΙΣΜΟΣ in 1 Corinthians 4.6,” NTS 40 (1994), 143–49; J. R. Wagner, “ ‘Not Beyond the Things Which Are Written’: A Call to Boast Only in the Lord (1 Cor 4.6),” NTS 21 (1998), 279–87; R. L. Tyler, “First Corinthians 4:6 and Hellenistic Pedagogy,” CBQ 60 (1998), 97–103.

Cf. Moffatt, 46, who leaves out the troublesome words by translating, “to teach you . . . that you are not to be puffed up.” He comments: “But between teach you and that in Greek five . . . words are inserted whose meaning lies beyond recovery.” Cf. Conzelmann, 86: “The phrase τὸ μὴ ὑπὲρ ἃ γέγραπται is unintelligible”; Senft, 67.

This would be the singular biblical example (although of course from this view it is not biblical) of ὑπέρ having a local sense, meaning “above” or “over.”

The conjecture has the following steps: (1) Paul originally wrote ἵνα ἐν ἡμῖν μάθητε ἵνα μὴ εἷς etc.; (2) in the next copy μή was dropped out accidentally; (3) in that copy or the next someone inserted μή between the lines above the α in ἵνα; (4) in that copy or the next, someone wrote τὸ μὴ ὑπὲρ ἃ γέγραπται in the margin, i.e., “the μή is written above the α”; (5) this copy fell into the hands of the copyist responsible for all succeeding copies of 1 Corinthians, who inserted the whole marginal gloss into the text in this form.

The conjecture originated with J. M. S. Baljon, De Tekst der Brieven van Paulus aan de Romeinen, de Corinthiümers en de Galatiümers als voorwerp van de conjecturaalkritiek beschouwd (Utrecht, 1884), 49–51. Although not always properly attributed to him, and in some cases taking slightly different forms, it was adopted in the commentaries by Schmiedel, Bousset, Héring, Williams, and Murphy-O’Connor (Weiss, R-P, and Conzelmann are tempted) and in the following studies: W. F. Howard, “1 Corinthians iv.6 (Exegesis or Emendation?),” ExpT 33 (1921/22), 479–80; J. T. Hudson, “1 Cor. iv.6,” ExpT 35 (1923/24), 332 (tempted); A. Legault, “ ‘Beyond the Things Which Are Written’ (I Cor. iv.6),” NTS 18 (1971/72), 227–31; and esp. J. Strugnell, “A Plea for Conjectural Emendation in the New Testament, with a Coda on 1 Cor 4:6,” CBQ 36 (1974), 543–58, who tries to remove some of the difficulties posited by Ross and others (see next note) by suggesting that the scribe who wrote the gloss in the margin intended to tell his readers that he added a μή “beyond what stands written,” i.e., it wasn’t in his text at all, but the sense needed it, so he marked the text accordingly. Strugnell’s position has been viewed favorably by D. R. MacDonald, “A Conjectural Emendation of 1 Cor 15:31–32; or, the Case of the Misplaced Lion Fight,” HTR 93 (1980), 261; and Murphy-O’Connor, Keys, 260–61.

See esp. the objections by J. M. Ross, “Not above What Is Written: A Note on 1 Cor 4:6,” ExpT 82 (1971), 215–17. The problem is compounded by two factors: (1) It takes at least five steps (fewer in Strugnell’s case) to get from an original without the words to the text as we now have it, and (2) it had to have happened so close to the source that all of these changes took place before a single copy of the original was able to be copied without the inserted gloss. Ross also notes regarding Baljon’s conjecture that the glossator would almost surely have written τὸ μὴ ὑπὲρ τὸ ἃ γέγραπται. For a considerable response to Strugnell, but more on the whole question of conjectural emendation than on this text per se, see G. D. Kilpatrick, “Conjectural Emendation in the New Testament,” in New Testament Textual Criticism, Its Significance for Exegesis: Essays in Honour of Bruce M. Metzger (ed. E. J. Epp and G. D. Fee; Oxford, 1981), 349–60.

See BDAG, ὁ, hα. Illustrations are legion, esp. in the early Greek Fathers’ citations of the Bible. In the NT see Matt. 19:18; Luke 22:37; Rom. 13:9; Gal. 5:14.

As, e.g., in Phillips: “that you might learn from what I have said about us.”

Cf. Collins, 180 (“how to appreciate the adage”) and Thiselton, 351 (“allusively applied all this”).

This was (rightly) changed in the NRSV to “the saying, ‘Nothing beyond what is written’ ”; cf. Barrett (“Nothing beyond what stands written”); JB (“Keep to what is written”); Williams (“Never go beyond what is written”).

This is argued for esp. by Hooker, “Beyond,” and Ellis, 61, 69, 74–75, 214.

As, e.g., Mare, 212: “[It] seems to be a general statement advising the Corinthians not to go beyond any written doctrine in the OT”; cf. the ESV, “learn by us [whatever the translators intended that to mean] not to go beyond what is written.” What is obscure is not made less so by further obscurity.

Changed in the REB to “not to go beyond the things that are written”; cf. GNB, “Observe the proper rules.” Another alternative of this kind was suggested by Parry, 78–79, namely that γέγραπται carries the technical sense of a contract or agreement. Hence he is telling them “ ‘not to go beyond the terms,’ i.e. of the commission as teacher.”

Chiefly on the grounds of Paul’s use of γέγραπται (“it stands written”) elsewhere.

This, of course, has not kept us from trying. Since this commentary first appeared, no less than four major articles have been devoted to ferreting it out: L. L. Welborn, “A Conciliatory Principle in 1 Cor. 4:6,” NovT 29 (1987), 320–46; D. R. Hall, “A Disguise for the Wise: ΜΕΤΑΣΧΗΜΑΤΙΣΜΟΣ in 1 Corinthians 4.6,” NTS 40 (1994), 143–49; J. R. Wagner, “ ‘Not beyond the Things Which Are Written’: A Call to Boast Only in the Lord (1 Cor 4.6),” NTS 21 (1998), 279–87; R. L. Tyler, “First Corinthians 4:6 and Hellenistic Pedagogy,” CBQ 60 (1998), 97–103.

Gk. ἐν ἡμῖν, either “in our case” or “by means of us,” referring to the preceding analogies.

On this matter Conzelmann, 86, was probably too skeptical in suggesting that “the second ἵνα-clause . . . is likewise difficult to fathom.

The Greek text reads εἷς φυσιοῦσθε, the εἷς in this case functioning much like a ἕκαστος (= each of you is puffed up); cf. 1:12, “each of you is saying.”

For reasons no longer clear, the original NIV had rendered this as a kind of general maxim, “in one over against another”; Paul’s own Greek makes the two nouns emphatic: “the one over against the other” (cf. BDAG 5d).

Cf. Matt. 6:24: “two masters, . . . the one, . . . the other”; Luke 17:34: “two people in bed, the one taken, the other left”; Luke 18:10: “two men, . . . the one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector.” When Paul wants to say “one for another,” as in 1 Thess. 5:11, it is simply εἷς τὸν ἕνα. This grammatical phenomenon also rules out any interpretation that sees the text as a general teaching on learning humility from the example of Paul and Apollos.

The questions unexpectedly appear in the second person singular, which in this case probably picks up “each one” from v. 6 and at the same time reflects Paul’s semitic background, in which the OT legal materials, spoken to all of Israel, are often given force by appearing in the singular: “Thou shalt, or shalt not.” This same kind of movement from a second plural to a second singular occurs again in 7:27–28; 8:9–10; 14:16–17; and 15:36.

Pride generally results from an improper perspective, both about oneself (whether of achievement or status) and about one’s true stance before God (deserving rather than nearly helpless).

Or perhaps irony would be intended: “You may think of yourself as better than another, but in reality there are no significant differences between you in God’s sight.”

Cf. BDAG: “Who concedes you any superiority?” and Moffatt, 48: “Who in the world sees anything special in you?”

So Findlay, 800; cf. Garland (137), “Divine grace levels the ground for all and requires gratitude and humility in response.”

The question belongs alongside those equally devastating questions in the OT in which one is brought face to face with the truth about oneself before God: e.g., Isa. 40:14: “Whom did the Lord consult to enlighten him?” (“You who know so much as now to question his ways?” being the implied response); cf. Job 38. I have regularly had people take me on in public settings over this point, the sadness of which is that they will never understand, and thus never experience, grace.

Gk. εἰ δὲ καί (“but if indeed”), which does not imply that they may not have received it, but reinforces the fact that they did indeed, thus “since.”

Gk. καυχᾶσαι again; cf. 1:29–31.

Despite the demurrer of v. 14 (q.v.).

As with the NRSV, the NIV marks the irony and rhetoric with exclamation points (the NAB does this with a single exclamation at the end of the three staccato exclamations). It is possible, as some do (e.g., TCNT, GNB, JB, Moffatt), to take the sentences as a continuation of the rhetorical questions of v. 7. Hence, “Do you already have everything you need? Are you already rich? Have you become kings, even though we are not?” (GNB). This has some attraction to it; however, the change in style from v. 7 is esp. pronounced and probably therefore suggests staccato indicatives. In either case, it is all irony.

Ellis, 77–79, doubts that this verse reflects an overrealized eschatology on the part of the Corinthians. See the response by A. C. Thiselton, “Realized Eschatology at Corinth,” NTS 24 (1976/77), 510–26.

Gk. κορέννυμι, a verb that is often used metaphorically in the religious and philosophical writers. Cf., e.g., Philo, leg.all. 3.111 (“we have glutted ourselves with immoderate pleasure”; cf. 183); post.Cain. 145 (“wherefore God ever causes his earliest gifts to cease before their recipients are glutted”).

Although one cannot be sure that Paul intended it, it is difficult not to connect this imagery with that of 3:1–2, where he has had to treat them as “babies” because they were not “grown up” enough to recognize the cross as the heart of all things that God is about in the new age. They think of themselves as adults, and Paul now allows that to the point of their being “stuffed” with rich food. But they gorge themselves on what eventually brings only leanness of soul.

Gk. πλουτέω (“become rich”) rather than the πλουτίζω (“be made rich”) of 1:5. The change from the perfect in the first sentence to the aorist with this and the next verb is not significant. The two aorists are ingressive: “you have become; you have begun. . . .”

As always in Paul; see 15:25; Rom. 5:14, 17, 21; 6:12. Even the RSV instinctively recognized this, for even though the first instance was translated “without us you have become kings,” the following clause was more correctly rendered: “And would that you did reign, so that we might share the rule with you.” Cf. Garland (137), “acting like kings.”

Cf. esp. how the argument of this section concludes with language about the kingdom of God (v. 20), which picks up the language of this verse.

Dan. 7:27; cf. Jesus in Luke 22:29–30 and the parable in Luke 19:17. See also Rev. 5:10; 20:4, 6; 22:5. Some (e.g., Findlay, Weiss, Conzelmann) have suggested that this is a reflection of Stoic parallels, perhaps adopted by the Corinthians, in which “the wise person is king.” The parallels are indeed striking (see esp. Philo, Abr. 261: “The kingdom of the wise person comes by the gift of God,” and Plutarch, Tranq.an. 472a: “In their [the Stoics’] sect the wise man . . . is a rich man and a king”). But one of the differences between these parallels and the Jewish heritage of Paul is in the static, positional character of the Stoic over against the Jewish apocalyptic emphasis on the dynamic character of the kingdom.

Findlay, 801, interprets the adverb ἤδη to mean “so soon” and the following χωρὶς ἡμῶν (“without us”) to mean “without our help” (cf. NAB). The whole, therefore, is seen not as eschatological but as Paul’s reflecting on their stance toward him over against their other teachers. “So soon you have become full, without our aid; etc.” It might have been possible to understand the first two in this way, but the addition of the third, with its distinctively eschatological language, rules decisively in the other direction.

Gk. καὶ ὄφελόν γε, indicating an unfulfillable wish.

The NIV leaves out an emphatic καί here, “even we” = “we ourselves also,” along with you.

For Paul’s use of the term “apostle” see on 1:1. In this context it must include Apollos as well as Peter. This is further evidence that for Paul, at least at this stage, the term was more functional than official. At least it included far more than the Twelve, as 15:7 also implies.

Gk. ἐπιθανατίους; cf. similar usage in the LXX of Bel 31, referring to those who were condemned to be thrown to the lions, two at a time, daily, and in Dion.Hal. 7.35 to the condemned who were thrown from a high rock overlooking the Forum.

This is a widely attested phenomenon. See, e.g., Dio Cassius, Roman History, VI; Jos. War 7.132–57. For a full discussion, see H. S. Versnel, Triumphus: An Inquiry into the Origin, Development, and Meaning of the Roman Triumph (Leiden, 1970).

The italicized words are not in the Greek text, but almost certainly represent Paul’s intent. For a recent presentation of the case for this interpretation, but without noting what the NIV had done here, see V. H. T. Nguyen, “The Identification of Paul’s Spectacle of Death Metaphor in 1 Corinthians 4.9,” NTS 53 (2007), 489–501; cf. also Garland, 140.

Gk. θέατρον; lit. “what one sees at a theater,” thus a play or a spectacle. It is common to note the Stoic use of this term, as found, e.g., in Seneca (prov. 2.9, 11; ep. 64.4–6); but Seneca thought of the Stoic as a “spectacle” of courage and strength before the gods, and thus for him it was a matter of pride. That is a far cry from Paul’s usage here. It is therefore probably not quite precise, and in any case irrelevant, to say that Paul has “taken over” the “Stoic picture of the philosopher’s struggle as a spectacle for the world” (Conzelmann, 88; cf. G. Kittel, TDNT 3:43; V. C. Pfitzner, Paul and the Agon Motif [NovTSup 16; Leiden, 1967], 189). See J. Sevenster, Paul and Seneca (NovTSup 4; Leiden, 1961), 115–16. Other Latin writers use the imagery, in a way similar to Paul, to express the “tragedy” of their lives; e.g., Sallust, Jug. 14.23; Pliny, panegyr. 33.3.

This is not a universal view about 2 Cor. 2:14. See the helpful discussion in Furnish, II Corinthians, 174–75. The argument by P. Marshall in this case seems conclusive (“A Metaphor of Social Shame: THRIAMBEUEIN in 2 Cor. 2:14,” NovT 25 [1983], 302–17), esp. since Egan’s entire argument is predicated on the use of a compound, not the simple verb itself (“Lexical Evidence on Two Pauline Passages,” NovT 19 [1977], 34–62).

On this see below on vv. 16–17.

Note esp. how 2 Corinthians carries on this theme in several sections, e.g., 2:14–6:13 and 10:1–13:10.

Gk. κόσμος, translated “universe” by the NIV because of the inclusion of “angels” as well as people.

G. Kittel, TDNT 3:43, suggests reminiscences to Job, whose sufferings were a spectacle to Satan; this would therefore imply fallen angels, which seems doubtful.

If we are correct that part of their misguided view of spirituality included the motif of being as the angels, then there might be some “punch” to this reference.

Theissen, 72–73, seems to miss both the irony and the point of the argument by suggesting that the terms in this passage are also intended primarily to be sociological. It is true that these three terms reflect the sociological terms of 1:26, but that’s quite the point of the irony. If they were intended to be sociological, that would make them “true” in another sense, and the irony would be lost.

Gk. διά, “for Christ’s sake,” as in almost all English translations.

This is not in the Greek text; it is the NIV’s attempt, along with the exclamation point, to emphasize the ironic character of the antitheses.

Gk. φρόνιμοι, a synonym of σοφία, with perhaps greater emphasis on the “sensible” character of the “wise” person. It is usually pejorative in Paul, as it is here (cf. 2 Cor. 11:19; Rom. 11:25; 12:16).

This is the point that Theissen () misses; but it is crucial. If Paul were truly addressing the well-born in the community, then that would still be the appropriate word. But he does not do so because the letter is not to those people, but to the community as a whole, of whom the majority are not well-born. But they can be ironically called “the honored.”

On this matter see esp. R. Hodgson, “Paul the Apostle and First Century Tribulation Lists,” ZNW 74 (1983), 59–80.

Especially in 2 Corinthians (4:8–9; 6:4–5, 8–10; 11:23–29; 12:10); cf. Rom. 8:35.

E.g., Epict. 2.19.24: “Show me a man who though sick is happy, though in danger is happy, though dying is happy, though condemned to exile is happy, though in disrepute is happy. Show him! By the gods I would fain see a Stoic!” (Loeb, 1:367); cf. 2.10.17. See esp. R. Bultmann, Der Stil der paulinischen Predigt und die kynisch-stoische Diatribe (Göttingen, 1910), 71–72.

E.g., the longer recension of 2 Enoch 66:6: “Walk, my children, in long-suffering, in meekness, in affliction, in distress, in faithfulness, in truth, in hope, in weakness, in derision, in assaults, in temptation, in deprivation, in nakedness, having love for one another, until you go out from this age of suffering” (OTP, 1:194). See W. Schrage, “Leid, Kreuz und Eschaton. Die Peristasenkataloge als Merkmale paulinischer theologia crucis und Eschatologie,” EvT 34 (1974), 141–75.

He puts into the mouth of Ananus the high priest these words (War 4.165): “When plundered you submit, when beaten you are silent, nay over the murdered none dares audibly to groan!” (Loeb, 3:51); cf. War 2.151–53.

See the collection in Hodgson ( above), 76–80.

Ibid., 72–74.

Gk. ἄχρι τῆς ἄρτι ὥρας . . . ἕως ἄρτι. This structural item seems intentional; however, it is probably going beyond the evidence to see the whole as an expression of chiasm, as does M. L. Barré, “Paul as ‘Eschatologic Person’: A New Look at 2 Cor 11:29,” CBQ 37 (1975), 520–22. The “pairs” of verbs in vv. 11b–12a seem forced and their corresponding relationship to the pairs in 12b–13a is not at all self-evident.

These words recur in the more complete list in 2 Cor. 11:23–29 (v. 27); they are also reflected elsewhere in the “famine” of Rom. 8:35 and the “hunger” and “want” of Phil. 4:12.

Gk. κολαφιζόμεθα (cf. 2 Cor. 12:7, denoting the messenger of Satan who “buffeted” Paul), a rare word, occurring chiefly in Christian authors. It may have a ring of being “cuffed . . . in an insulting manner,” as Barrett, 111, suggests, but there is nothing inherent in the word nor the context to demand this further nuance. See K. L. Schmidt, TDNT 3:818–21.

Except in the case of a missionary for whom it might be an added burden of time and energy. It may well be, of course, that the hunger, etc., are partly the result of his refusal to accept patronage and thus are directly related to his “working with his own hands.”

On this question see esp. chap. 4 (“Tentmaking and Apostleship: The Debate at Corinth”) in R. F. Hock, Social Context, 50–65.

The same rhetorical style appears in the antitheses of 2 Cor. 4:8–9, but the nature and purpose of those are considerably different from these.

Paul: λοιδορούμενοι εὐλογοῦμεν; Luke: εὐλογεῖτε τοὺς καταρωμένους ὑμᾶς. But note esp. the language of Rom. 12:14: εὐλογεῖτε καὶ μὴ καταρᾶσθε. Here is another example of Paul and Luke reflecting the same language of the Jesus tradition, which is what one might well expect (cf. 11:23–25; 1 Tim. 5:18; et al.).

Changed in the REB to “we entreat.”

Cf. Lam. 3:45: “You have made us scum and refuse among the nations.” Although the Greek words used by Paul, περικαθάρματα and περίψημα, are not used in the LXX, his metaphor here is remarkably similar to the notion in the Lamentations text. See A. T. Hanson, “1 Corinthians 4:13b and Lamentations 3:45,” ExpT 93 (1982), 214–15.

For περικαθάρματα see, e.g., Epict. 3.22.78: “And did Priam, who begot fifty sons, all rascals (περικαθάρματα)?” (Loeb, 2:159); cf. Philo, virt. 174, who lists it as one among several such terms as to how the arrogant regard others.

Cf. BDAG and F. Hauck, TDNT 3:430–31 on περικαθάρματα, and BDAG and G. Stählin, TDNT 6:84–93 on περίψημα. Among commentators, see Lightfoot, Weiss, Héring, Barrett, and Bruce (the latter two cautiously). This interpretation is rejected altogether by R-P, Allo, and Conzelmann.

Gk. πάντων could be either masculine, “all people,” or neuter, “all things.” The “of the world” of the NIV is not quite precise.

From Annie Johnson Flint, “He Giveth More Grace.”

Barrett, 113.

The evidence is divided between νουθετῶ (P⁴⁶ B D F G Ψ Maj latt) and νουθετῶν (P^11vid A C P 6 33 104 365 630 945 1175 1739 pc). In this case P⁴⁶ and B seem to have abandoned the rest of the Egyptian tradition. The add/omit of the ν could have been accidental in either direction. The question must finally be decided on the grounds of Pauline style, which favors the participle. The οὐ/ἀλλά formula ordinarily contrasts coordinates in Paul, in this case “not shaming”/“but admonishing.” Otherwise Barrett, 113, who offers no explanation for his choice.

The NIV translators apparently assume that the sense of Paul’s explanatory γάρ, which was omitted by a few witnesses (P⁴⁶ pc g), is in fact picked up by the sense of the present rendering.

B and 1506 omit Ἰησοῦ, probably in conformity to the ἐν Χριστῷ that has just preceded it.

A few late MSS add the words καθὼς κἀγὼ Χριστοῦ from 11:1. Although not original, they do capture Paul’s intent.

A few of the Egyptian MSS (P¹¹ * A P 33 81 1175 2495) add an αὐτό, which would strengthen the conjunction to mean “for this very reason.” Both the word order and Pauline style rule against it. Paul always has εἰς αὐτὸ τοῦτο for this idiom (cf. Zuntz, 63). Probably it represents a dittography.

The exact wording of the name here is more complex than in v. 15 (see above). The alternatives are: (1) Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ (P⁴⁶ C 6 33 81 104 629 630 1175 1739 1881 pc a bo); (2) κυρίῳ Ἰησοῦ (D F G); or (3) simply Χριστῷ (A B Ψ Maj b sa). Variant (2) is secondary; it has been influenced by the immediately preceding κυρίῳ. A case can be made for either (1) or (3) as conformation to one of the forms in v. 15. See Zuntz, 181, for the argument for the longer reading; cf. Metzger, 484.

This is the clear evidence that what is sometimes called “street Calvinism” (= once-saved-always-saved, so that Christian behavior is somewhat optional) is utterly non-Pauline and therefore unbiblical.

Gk. ἐντρέπων, a word that originally meant to “turn in,” hence “to hang one’s head,” either in respect (cf. Matt. 21:37) or in shame (as here). The word is to be distinguished from καταισχύνω in 1:27, which connotes “disgrace.”

Gk. ταῦτα, “these things.” It is possible that this includes the whole of what has preceded; at least its antecedent is vv. 6–13. B. Sanders, “Imitating Paul: 1 Cor 4:16,” HTR 74 (1981), 353–63, sees it as recalling the ταῦτα of v. 6, hence “the description of Paul’s and Apollos’s role as servants according to 3:5–4:13” (354). Fiore, “Covert Allusion,” 97–98, would make it refer to the “admonitions of the whole hortatory section [i.e., 1:10–4:13].” But it is not emphatic here, as is the case in v. 6. Sanders’s concern is the correct one, but he is perhaps asking the pronoun to carry too much weight.

In Eph. 6:4 the proper duty of the parent is to bring up the child in the νουθεσία of the Lord. Cf. Wis. 11:10, ὡς πατὴρ νουθετῶν (“admonishing as a father”).

Gk. νουθετῶ; cf. 1 Thess. 5:12, 14; 2 Thess. 3:15; Rom. 15:14; Col. 1:28; 3:16 (and in the Pauline speech in Acts 20:31); see also νουθεσία (1 Cor. 10:11; Eph. 6:4; Tit. 3:10).

J. Behm, TDNT 4:1021.

Gk. ἀγαπητά, “beloved,” a favorite adjective in Paul. It is used absolutely in 10:14 (“my beloved”) and with ἀδελφοί in 15:58 (“my beloved brothers”).

E. M. Lassen has pointed out the connections between Paul’s use of this metaphorical language and that in Roman imperial propaganda (“The Use of the Father Image in Imperial Propaganda and 1 Corinthians 4:14–21,” TynB 42 [1991], 127–36).

E.g., in the Wisdom literature the term “my Son” is used for the one who is instructed in the way of Wisdom (see, e.g., Prov. 1:8, 10; 2:1; 3:1, etc.; Eccl. 12:12; Sir. 2:1; 3:1; etc.). For rabbinic examples see Str-B, 3:339–41.

Gk. ἐγέννησα, the regular verb for begetting children and referring either to the father’s or the mother’s role.

This is an attempt to give to ἐάν with the subjunctive the sense of a contemplated future result suggested by Robertson, Grammar, 1018.

Gk. μυρίος; the NIV’s “ten thousand” is probably too literal here. It may mean that, but in this kind of context it means “innumerable, countless” (cf. 14:19).

See Turner, Syntax, 330 for this meaning of ἀλλά in a conditional sentence.

Gk. παιδαγωγός (cf. Gal. 3:24). Cf. J. B. Lightfoot, The Epistle of St. Paul to the Galatians (repr. Grand Rapids, 1957), 148–49. J. C. O’Neill has pointed out the similar use of this imagery by both Jewish and Hellenistic moralists in “Pedagogues in the Pauline Corpus (1 Corinthians 4.15; Galatians 3.24, 25),” Irish Biblical Studies 23 (2001), 50–65.

See, e.g., Xenophon, de rep.Lac. 3.2; Plato, Lys. 208c; Diog. L. 3.92; Philo, leg.ad Gai. 53.

That they in particular were intended is the standard view. If so, then it would seem that Paul is hereby retracting much that has been said. Therefore, several have argued that the “countless number of guardians in Christ” refers esp. to those within the community who are presently leading them astray. They are the “some who are arrogant” of v. 18. See Parry, 83; Furnish, “Fellow Workers,” 370; and Munck, Paul, 152. This makes more sense of the full data of the argument. But in either case it should not be read quite so pejoratively.

Cf. b. Sanh. 19b: “R. Samuel . . . said . . . : He who teaches the son of his neighbour the Torah, Scripture ascribes it to him as if he had begotten him.”

Gk. inferential οὖν, somewhat rare in 1 Corinthians.

Gk. παρακαλῶ. See on 1:10; it is probably to make too much of this verb to see it as key to the structure of the entire passage as Dahl does (“Paul,” 319), followed by Fiore, “Covert Allusion.” To make a technical term of what in this context is simply an appropriate verb, fitting nicely the argument of the paragraph but not necessarily reaching all the way back to 1:10, is to put a straightjacket on an author’s use of language; the verb is simply too common in Paul to make too much of it here.

As an expression of the relationship both between teachers and pupils and between a worshiper and his deity, this word had a long history in both the Greco-Roman and Jewish worlds. See W. Michaelis, TDNT 4:659–74. For Paul’s own Jewish background see Wis. 4:2 (imitating wisdom); ep.Ar. 188, 210, 281 (imitating God); 4 Macc. 9:23 (imitating a holy martyr); Jos. Ant. 1.68 (descendants of Seth who imitated his ways); 8.315 (Asa, who imitated David); Philo, virt. 66 (Joshua imitating Moses); congr.qu.er. 70. Philo’s own understanding of the concept is found in this latter reference: “for the practiser must be the imitator of a life, not the hearer of words, since the latter is the characteristic mark of the recipient of teaching, and the former of the strenuous self-exerciser” (Loeb, 4:493). The term does not refer to one who mimics, nor even to one who follows as a disciple, but to the person who actually internalizes and lives out the model that has been set before them.

See Sanders (), who rightly urges that the nature of much in this section, as well as in the letter as a whole, points to a breakdown in communal life, which the coming of Timothy in part is intended to correct by a different example from what is currently going on among them.

There is a considerable bibliography on this motif in Paul. Among other items, see esp. W. Michaelis, TDNT 4:659–74; D. M. Stanley, “ ‘Become Imitators of Me’: The Pauline Conception of Apostolic Tradition,” Bib 40 (1959), 859–77; W. P. de Boer, The Imitation of Paul (Kampen, 1960), 92–196; and H. D. Betz, Nachfolge und Nachahmung Jesu Christi im Neuen Testament (Tübingen, 1967).

An extreme view, influenced esp. by R. Bultmann (e.g., “The Significance of the Historical Jesus for the Theology of Paul,” in Faith and Understanding [ET, New York, 1966], 220–46), and one that was for years almost a byword in German and American scholarship, has argued that, to all intents and purposes, the teaching of Jesus was irrelevant to Paul. But the historical evidence seems to be largely against this. See, e.g., W. D. Davies, “The Moral Teaching of the Early Church,” in Jewish and Pauline Studies (Philadelphia, 1984), 278–88. For a brief, but helpful, survey of this debate, see Dungan, xvii-xxxiii.

Paul had earlier affirmed that the Thessalonians had “imitated” the example of both Christ and the missionaries. This passage is esp. instructive. The commendation lies in the fact that “in spite of severe suffering they welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit.” This seems to be a certain allusion to the content of Luke 6:22–23 (//Matt. 5:11–12).

Grayston’s position (“Rod,” 13–16), that Paul had been “stung” so badly by his former association with the law that he also rejected any form of the teachings of Jesus that might take the form of law, seems to go a bit too far, esp. in light of the parenetic sections of Paul’s letters.

Including its relationship to his mission to Macedonia at about this same time, mentioned in Acts 19:22.

K. E. Bailey, “Structure,” would begin the second “essay” of the letter at this point (4:17–7:40), which he entitles “Men and Women in the Human Family (sex).” To do so, he argues that the τοῦτο (“this reason”) in this διὰ τοῦτο points forward to Timothy’s reminding them of his ways, rather than to v. 16. In a sense that is true, but the whole reason for v. 17 is v. 16. A major structural break here is quite arbitrary and has too many contextual and structural strikes against it, not to mention problems with content and flow of thought. This view has now been adopted by C-R, but their discussion is even less convincing. It is hardly a matter of wonder that no editors of Greek texts or translations have been convinced to restructure their presentations of Paul at this point.

In Greek letters the aorist is often used for events taking place at the time of writing, which when read by the recipients will already have taken place. Thus the aorist is often used for such references. A clear example is the νῦν δὲ ἔγραψα in 5:11, where the “now” means the letter he is currently writing (1 Corinthians).

At least the sending; whether Timothy ever arrived is a moot point. J. B. Lightfoot thinks not, since it is not mentioned in 2 Cor. 12:17–18 and since Acts 19:22 and 2 Cor. 1:1 imply that Timothy got only as far as Macedonia (2 Corinthians was apparently written from Macedonia). See “The Mission of Titus to the Corinthians,” in Biblical Essays (London, 1893), 271–84.

Cf. Acts 18:5 and 1 Thess. 1:1 for evidence of his presence in Corinth; at least the return portion of the mission to Thessalonica mentioned in 1 Thess. 3:1–6 took place in Corinth.

Gk. ἀγαπητός, as in v. 14.

Cf. the description in Phil. 2:19–23, in a passage that functions differently from this one. There Timothy is to be understood as the bearer of the letter, and the passage functions as the “epistolary commendation” of the letter-bearer.

Gk. ὁδούς. This word almost certainly reflects Paul’s Jewish background, in which the teaching of Torah is halakah (lit. “a way of walking”); cf. Paul’s use of the verb περιπατεῖν (“to walk”) as a basic metaphor for ethical behavior (e.g., 3:3; 7:17; Gal. 5:16). Some would limit Paul’s “ways” to his doctrinal instruction only, on the basis of the last clause, “even as I teach everywhere in every church” (e.g., Weiss, 119–20; W. Michaelis, TDNT 5:87–88). But that is to miss Paul’s own understanding too widely. For him “doctrine” includes ethics, or it is no doctrine at all. The Paul who appears in some “reformed” theologies is definitely not the Paul who appears in his own letters. Correct “belief” without its consequent impact on how one lives would have been utterly repugnant to Paul.

On this whole question see esp. R. W. Funk, “The Apostolic Parousia: Form and Significance,” in Christian History and Interpretation, Studies Presented to John Knox (ed. W. R. Farmer, C. F. D. Moule, and R. R. Niebuhr; Cambridge, 1967), 249–68.

See on 1:2; cf. 7:17; 11:16; 14:33, 36.

For the details of the proposed visit see on 16:5–9.

In what can only be considered a truly idiosyncratic moment in NT scholarship, C-R have chosen to make this paragraph introduce chap. 5, even though there is not a moment in the passage that would seem to support such a view, while everything said here helps to bring closure to the whole; see .

Gk. ἐφυσιώθησαν. The aorist is used because the situation has been reported to him as a definite fact; it does not exclude the present reality, hence the English perfect is permissible.

On the possible (probable?) identification of these people, see the introduction, .

See on 1:26 above regarding the “not many of you.”

He is at least anticipating this kind of difficulty in 2 Cor. 1:12–24.

One cannot be certain how long this was. According to Acts 19:8–10, Paul was in Ephesus for at least three months over two years. According to 1 Cor. 16:5–9, Paul feels that his time in Ephesus is coming to an end.

Dahl (“Paul,” 325–29) has offered the intriguing hypothesis that the squabble within the community was related to this issue as an internal fight as to whether even to write their letter to him, since he had shown no interest in returning. “Why write to him?” some were arguing.

Gk. ταχέως; see BDAG 2, “pert[aining] to a future point of time that is subsequent to another point of time, with focus on brevity or interval rather than on speed of action.”

Cf. the note by the translators of the NAB, that “4:20 picks up the contrast between a certain kind of talk (logos) and true power (dynamis) from 1 Cor 1:17–18.” This observation esp. calls into question C-R’s idiosyncratic positioning of this paragraph as the introduction to chap. 5, whose arguments for doing so (192–94) fall esp. short of carrying conviction (cf. above).

See further 6:9–10 and 15:24, 50 below; cf. elsewhere 2 Thess 1:5; Gal. 5:21; Rom. 14:17; Col. 1:13; 4:11; Eph. 5:5; 2 Tim. 4:18.

Craig, 59, says that this is “the schoolmaster’s whip,” apparently following the argument of C. Schneider, TDNT 6:966–70 (cf. Lightfoot, 201). But this is an unfortunate breaking of the imagery, as well as lexically unsound, as D. Daube has shown. See “Paul a Hellenistic Schoolmaster?” in Studies in Rationalism, Judaism and Universalism in Memory of Leon Roth (ed. R. Loewe; London, 1966), 67–71.

The original NIV had rendered this “whip,” apparently also under the influence of Schneider (see ). The imagery is the “rod of correction/discipline,” found throughout the OT (Exod. 21:20; 2 Sam. 7:14; Prov. 10:13; 22:15; Isa. 10:24; Lam. 3:1); “whip” was both pejorative and misleading. Cf. also Plato, leg. 3.700c; Plut. Mor. 268D, 693F.

Gk. πνεύματι πραΰτητος; cf. Gal. 6:1.

For a thorough discussion of this term both for Jesus and for the Christian ethic in general, see R. Guelich, The Sermon on the Mount (Waco, 1982), 79–83.

Findlay, 806; cf. H. D. Betz, Galatians (Hermeneia; Philadelphia, 1979), 297 n. 48, who says of the identical phrase in Gal. 6:1 that “it refers both to the divine and to the human spirit.”

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