1 Corinthians

By Paul D. Gardner

Concentrate on the biblical author's message as it unfolds.

Designed to assist the pastor and Bible teacher in conveying the significance of God's Word, the Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament series treats the literary context and structure of every passage of the New Testament book in the original Greek.

With a unique layout designed to help you comprehend the form and flow of each passage, the ZECNT unpacks:

• The key message.
• The author's original translation.
• An exegetical outline.
• Verse-by-verse commentary.
• Theology in application.

While primarily designed for those with a basic knowledge of biblical Greek, all who strive to understand and teach the New Testament will benefit from the depth, format, and scholarship of these volumes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zondervan
• Release date: Apr 3, 2018
• ISBN: 9780310557012

Paul D. Gardner

Paul Gardner (PhD, Cambridge University) taught for seven years at Oak Hill, an Anglican Seminary in London, after his ordination. He then moved to parish ministry in Cheshire. Following a time as Archdeacon of Exeter, in 2005 he moved to become senior pastor of ChristChurch Presbyterian, Atlanta, USA. Now retired to the UK, he travels widely, teaching in Africa and South America. He has published a number of books and articles, including commentaries on Ephesians, 1 and 2 Peter, Jude, and Revelation.    

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Series Introduction

This generation has been blessed with an abundance of excellent commentaries. Some are technical and do a good job of addressing issues that the critics have raised; other commentaries are long and provide extensive information about word usage and catalogue nearly every opinion expressed on the various interpretive issues; still other commentaries focus on providing cultural and historical background information; and then there are those commentaries that endeavor to draw out many applicational insights.

The key question to ask is: What are you looking for in a commentary? This commentary series might be for you if

• you have taken Greek and would like a commentary that helps you apply what you have learned without assuming you are a well-trained scholar.

• you would find it useful to see a concise, one- or two-sentence statement of what the commentator thinks the main point of each passage is.

• you would like help interpreting the words of Scripture without getting bogged down in scholarly issues that seem irrelevant to the life of the church.

• you would like to see a visual representation (a graphical display) of the flow of thought in each passage.

• you would like expert guidance from solid evangelical scholars who set out to explain the meaning of the original text in the clearest way possible and to help you navigate through the main interpretive issues.

• you want to benefit from the results of the latest and best scholarly studies and historical information that help to illuminate the meaning of the text.

• you would find it useful to see a brief summary of the key theological insights that can be gleaned from each passage and some discussion of the relevance of these for Christians today.

These are just some of the features that characterize the new Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament series. The idea for this series was refined over time by an editorial board who listened to pastors and teachers express what they wanted to see in a commentary series based on the Greek text. That board consisted of myself, George H. Guthrie, William D. Mounce, Thomas R. Schreiner, and Mark L. Strauss along with Zondervan senior editor at large Verlyn Verbrugge, and former Zondervan senior acquisitions editor Jack Kuhatschek. We also enlisted a board of consulting editors who are active pastors, ministry leaders, and seminary professors to help in the process of designing a commentary series that will be useful to the church. Zondervan senior acquisitions editor Katya Covrett has now been shepherding the process to completion, and Constantine R. Campbell is now serving on the board.

We arrived at a design that includes seven components for the treatment of each biblical passage. What follows is a brief orientation to these primary components of the commentary.

Literary Context

In this section, you will find a concise discussion of how the passage functions in the broader literary context of the book. The commentator highlights connections with the preceding and following material in the book and makes observations on the key literary features of this text.

Main Idea

Many readers will find this to be an enormously helpful feature of this series. For each passage, the commentator carefully crafts a one- or two-sentence statement of the big idea or central thrust of the passage.

Translation and Graphical Layout

Another unique feature of this series is the presentation of each commentator’s translation of the Greek text in a graphical layout. The purpose of this diagram is to help the reader visualize, and thus better understand, the flow of thought within the text. The translation itself reflects the interpretive decisions made by each commentator in the Explanation section of the commentary. Here are a few insights that will help you to understand the way these are put together:

1. On the far left side next to the verse numbers is a series of interpretive labels that indicate the function of each clause or phrase of the biblical text. The corresponding portion of the text is on the same line to the right of the label. We have not used technical linguistic jargon for these, so they should be easily understood.

2. In general, we place every clause (a group of words containing a subject and a predicate) on a separate line and identify how it is supporting the principal assertion of the text (namely, is it saying when the action occurred, how it took place, or why it took place?). We sometimes place longer phrases or a series of items on separate lines as well.

3. Subordinate (or dependent) clauses and phrases are indented and placed directly under the words that they modify. This helps the reader to more easily see the nature of the relationship of clauses and phrases in the flow of the text.

4. Every main clause has been placed in bold print and pushed to the left margin for clear identification.

5. Sometimes when the level of subordination moves too far to the right—as often happens with some of Paul’s long, involved sentences!—we reposition the flow to the left of the diagram, but use an arrow to indicate that this has happened.

6. The overall process we have followed has been deeply informed by principles of discourse analysis and narrative criticism (for the Gospels and Acts).

Structure

Immediately following the translation, the commentator describes the flow of thought in the passage and explains how certain interpretive decisions regarding the relationship of the clauses were made in the passage.

Exegetical Outline

The overall structure of the passage is described in a detailed exegetical outline. This will be particularly helpful for those who are looking for a way to concisely explain the flow of thought in the passage in a teaching or preaching setting.

Explanation of the Text

As an exegetical commentary, this work makes use of the Greek language to interpret the meaning of the text. If your Greek is rather rusty (or even somewhat limited), don’t be too concerned. All the Greek words are cited in parentheses following an English translation. We have made every effort to make this commentary as readable and useful as possible even for the nonspecialist.

Those who will benefit the most from this commentary will have had the equivalent of two years of Greek in college or seminary. This would include a semester or two of working through an intermediate grammar (such as Wallace, Porter, Brooks and Winbery, or Dana and Mantey). The authors use the grammatical language that is found in these kinds of grammars. The details of the grammar of the passage, however, are discussed only when it has a bearing on the interpretation of the text.

The emphasis in this section of the text is to convey the meaning. Commentators examine words and images, grammatical details, relevant OT and Jewish background to a particular concept, historical and cultural context, important text-critical issues, and various interpretational issues that surface.

Theology in Application

This, too, is a unique feature for an exegetical commentary series. We felt it was important for each author not only to describe what the text means in its various details, but also to take a moment and reflect on the theological contribution that it makes. In this section, the theological message of the passage is summarized. The authors discuss the theology of the text in terms of its place within the book and in a broader biblical-theological context. Finally, each commentator provides some suggestions on what the message of the passage is for the church today. At the conclusion of each volume in this series is a summary of the whole range of theological themes touched on by this book of the Bible.

Our sincere hope and prayer is that you find this series helpful not only for your own understanding of the text of the New Testament, but as you are actively engaged in teaching and preaching God’s Word to people who are hungry to be fed on its truth.

CLINTON E. ARNOLD, general editor

Author’s Preface

My love for biblical studies really began while running a candle-making business in Cambridge with Dr. Jim Hurley, who was studying 1 Corinthians at Tyndale House for his PhD! We both needed the extra money, and my wife and I were trying to save enough money to go to seminary in the United States. Eventually doors were opened, and I was able to study at Reformed Theological Seminary where I met Dr. Simon Kistemaker. Later he wrote the commentary on 1 Corinthians in the Hendriksen New Testament Commentary series. His excellent, pastorally centered, New Testament teaching and his strong personal encouragement confirmed me in my desire to go on to a PhD. I returned to Cambridge where professor Morna Hooker accepted me as a student with 1 Corinthians 8–10 as the area of study. I remain so grateful for her deep scrutiny of each step of that doctoral work.

Following ordination, I taught Greek, New Testament, and homiletics at Oak Hill Theological College, an Anglican seminary in north London. First Corinthians again figured in the schedule. Since then I have returned to the Oak Hill library for times of study and am thankful for the facilities they have let me use. I also owe a great debt of gratitude to the wardens and staff at Tyndale House Library, who provided a place to study and invaluable advice during the PhD writing and in later sabbaticals. Without them I could never have completed this work.

I am also most grateful to three bishops who, over many years, constantly encouraged me in various writing and teaching projects while pastoring churches under their oversight: the Rt. Revds. Michael Baughen, Michael Langrish, and Dr. Peter Forster. While pastoring churches in the UK and the United States, I have taken a couple of opportunities to preach through the whole of this wonderful epistle and have taught it at various seminaries. All Scripture is profitable for all God’s people in all times, but in a society that above all prizes knowledge and wisdom and affords most recognition to the best educated and most articulate, in a society that is preoccupied with status and with individualistic approaches to life, in a society that serves many gods with the deepest of idolatries, this epistle seems to say it all as God speaks to our generation.

It is mainly for this reason that I have been encouraged in the long process of writing a commentary while serving full-time in a church. This series affords me the opportunity to examine the Greek text exegetically but also to offer possible applications of this text on the understanding that God’s word is for the church of all generations.

I am most grateful to the general editor of this series, Dr. Clint Arnold, for his many kind encouragements and his detailed helpful comments on the work, and to Dr. George Guthrie, who has provided invaluable and meticulous help with the grammatical charting and other areas of the work. This work could not have been completed without the gracious support of the elders and congregation of Christ-Church Presbyterian in Atlanta and of my assistants, especially Ms. Jessica Hudson, who has helped proofread and sort footnotes and bibliography with such attention to detail. Above all the support of Sharon, my wife, has been unstinting and wonderfully encouraging, particularly during those times when I have been tempted to give up. Always she has been there for me in every area of our joint ministry. Together we have sought to live our lives determined to know nothing . . . except Jesus Christ and him crucified (2:2). At times we have fallen far short, but in the end we know we are known by God (8:3), and so we pray that this commentary will in some small way serve his glory.

PAUL GARDNER

Abbreviations

Introduction

Paul’s Corinthian epistles have fascinated, encouraged, and challenged Christians throughout the centuries. From the earliest times they have stimulated pastoral exposition and the writing of many commentaries and, in more recent years, the multiplication of articles in both the popular Christian press and the most erudite journals. The topics upon which Paul touches as he writes have undoubtedly generated much of this continued interest across the generations.

While 1 Corinthians is rightly first to be seen as a product of an apostle’s concern for a particular church and its attendant problems, there is no doubt that the wider church through the ages has been attracted to this epistle because so much of its teaching appears easily and immediately applicable in any generation. This letter has been employed through generations of the church’s teaching on matters as diverse as marriage and singleness, sexual conduct and immorality, idolatry, use of spiritual gifts, the last things, the wisdom of the world and its impact on the church, pride, problems between the wealthy and the poor, church unity, and many other subjects.

Apart from the obviously practical messages of the letter, it is also replete with episodes of great theological depth. It contains Paul’s longest exposition on the nature of love as the marker par excellence of true faith, through to his longest theological treatment of the resurrection. Above all, perhaps, the reader cannot fail to see how underlying everything that Paul writes is his humble and total commitment to a theologia crucis, to know nothing among [them] except Jesus Christ and him crucified (2:2). Communicating and upholding this gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ is Paul’s compulsion, laid upon him by God (9:16–17). Here he expounds and applies that gospel, sometimes even drawing upon his own Christian experience to illustrate the implications of its content for the individual believer and for the church. His application of the gospel to the church’s life is offered at times with joy and encouragement but also at times with strong admonition, as he reveals his grave concern for a people who have easily been drawn back into the wisdom of this age (2:6). Yet even when this is the case and Paul seems to be chastising the Corinthians, it is clear he does so from a position of deep love for his brothers and sisters and as one who also sees himself as their father in Christ Jesus (4:15 ESV), and them as beloved children (4:14 ESV).

Of course, it is probably fair to say that the text can hardly bear the weight of all the teaching notionally based upon it, but there is no doubt that for the interested Christian this book feels at times as if it might have been written for the twenty-first century church. In fact, as pastors and students examine the socio-historical and religious background into which Paul wrote, as they study Paul’s emphasis on the Lord Jesus Christ against a backdrop of his own society, as they examine Paul’s intriguing use of Scripture, and as they examine the development of Paul’s arguments, they will at once find depths that may not have been immediately apparent and, in God’s providence, speak even more clearly than they might imagine to today’s world. After all, this too is a generation which needs to be reminded that the the folly of God is wiser than the wisdom of men and women and the weakness of God is stronger than the strength of men and women (1:25).

The Author

That the apostle Paul was the author of this epistle is not disputed. The inclusion of the cosender is rare in Greek letters, being found in only a very few papyri letters of the hundreds now available. However, it is not uncommon in Paul’s own letters as, for example, with the mention of Timothy and Silvanus in 1 Thessalonians 1:1 and 2 Thessalonians 1:1. Here in 1 Corinthians 1:1 Paul mentions Sosthenes (see comments on 1:1), who may well be the Sosthenes who suffered persecution in Corinth in Acts 18:17 and is referred to as the ruler of the synagogue. Sosthenes may have been the amanuensis, or it may simply be that Paul wants to be clear that Sosthenes is with him and aiding him in his ministry and, like him, has love and concern for the church at Corinth.

Paul in Corinth

Acts 18 provides a secondary source for understanding the nature of Paul’s original evangelistic mission to the city. Allowing that the sequence of Paul’s journeys as recounted in Acts is accurate, then we can see Paul’s first arrival in Corinth as occurring on his second extensive missionary journey. This journey began in Antioch before moving on to Derbe, Lystra, and Iconium, across the Aegean Sea to Philippi, then south to Thessalonica, Berea, and eventually Athens where Paul preached first in the Jewish synagogue and then to Stoic and Epicurean philosophers at the Areopagus (17:16–34). Luke then informs the reader that Paul left Athens and went to Corinth (18:1). In Corinth Paul once again taught and reasoned first in the synagogue. Whether he met Aquila and Priscilla through the synagogue or while seeking to carry out his trade of tent making¹ is not clear (18:3). They were Jews who had been forced to leave Rome under an edict from the Emperor Claudius, and they worked at the same trade as Paul. If they were not Christians when they arrived in Corinth, they certainly were by the time Paul left (18:26; 1 Cor 16:19). Though the majority of Jews rejected the message, we read of the conversion of Crispus, a ruler of the synagogue, and of Titius Justus, who lived next door to the synagogue and was a worshipper of God (18:7–8). Many other Corinthians were converted. However, it seems something caused Paul to think of moving on, at which point the Lord directly intervened through a vision and told him not to be afraid but to keep on speaking. The message of the vision hints at the fact that Paul may have been thinking of leaving as he saw the opposition building against him and the recent converts.

The Lord promised he would be with Paul and that there were yet many people who would come to faith (vv. 9–10). So Paul stayed in Corinth for a further eighteen months—in all, perhaps two years (v. 11). In the end, largely inspired by the Jewish people, serious persecution broke out during the time of Gallio, the proconsul (vv. 12–16). The synagogue leader Sosthenes, mentioned above (see also 1 Cor 1:1), was seized and beaten by the Jews, probably because he too had become a Christian (Acts 18:17). Even after this we read Paul stayed on for many days, but eventually set sail for Syria with Priscilla and Aquila (v. 18). The account Luke gives provides every indication that a church of a number of converts had been well established by the time Paul left. It would have contained both the converted Jews mentioned in Acts but also the many of the Greek, pagan society who also had come to faith. In 1 Corinthians 3:6 Paul refers to having planted this church.

Date and Occasion of the Epistle

It is likely that this epistle, which was written from Ephesus, was penned sometime in AD 54 (or perhaps AD 55), perhaps a little before Pentecost (16:8).² Acts 18:2 refers to Priscilla and Aquila having recently arrived from Italy where they had been subject to the emperor’s order for Jews to leave Rome. That decree probably was issued in AD 49.³ This ties in reasonably well with Acts 18:12. There Luke tells us that Gallio was the proconsul in Achaia, when Paul was preaching there. This provides the more secure date by which to anchor Paul’s dates in Corinth.⁴ Gallio most likely took over his responsibilities in June or July AD 51 or AD 52 and did not last a full two years. Since Gallio must have been reasonably established in his role by the time he encountered Paul (18:14–15), and Paul seems to have been there eighteen months by that time (18:11) and then stayed on many days in Corinth after this encounter, it is reasonable to assume that Paul left Corinth in late AD 51 or spring/summer AD 52 after nearly two years of ministry.⁵ A number of factors then suggest the passing of perhaps two-and-a-half years before this letter is written.

As we read 1 Corinthians, it is clear that during the intervening period between Paul’s leaving Corinth and the writing of this letter, the church had continued to advance, probably both in numbers and in its impact upon the city. At some stage during that time, Apollos had spent time with the church and had watered the work (1 Cor 3:5–7). No doubt Apollos had helped teach in the church and contributed to its long-term establishment. Paul was at pains to say that Apollos’s work was in line with his own and that he and Apollos were not divided (3:8–9). Indeed, Paul had urged Apollos to visit the church again (16:12).

Also, during this intervening period Paul had written another letter (5:9), in which he had clearly expressed concern for the way the Corinthian Christians had been associating with sexually immoral people.⁶ Since 1 Corinthians 5 deals with incest being tolerated in their midst, the previous letter may have addressed that specific issue. It is difficult to imagine that such sin would have arisen while Apollos was in Corinth, and some time must be allowed for such an attitude to sin to develop in the congregation.

In terms of the occasion of our epistle, even if in some sense it is a follow-up to the letter mentioned in 5:9, the reason for writing is broader. First Corinthians clearly indicates that Paul had received considerable information about the church, probably over some period of time, from at least three sources. First, he has heard reports from Chloe’s people (1:11). She may have been a business woman based either in Ephesus or in Corinth. Clearly Paul trusted her emissaries. Parts of the epistle seem closely related to these oral reports; for example, 1:11–4:5, 11:17–34, and chapter 15:12–34. A second source for his information was a letter from the Corinthian church. It would seem that an official or semi-official delegation from the church made up of Stephanas, Fortunatus, and Achaicus might have carried this letter to Paul (16:17). Again, parts of the epistle, especially those sections starting with the phrase now concerning, probably address that letter (7:1, 25; 8:1; 12:1; and perhaps 16:1). Finally, given that Paul has clearly talked with Apollos about the situation in Corinth (4:6; 16:12), it is safe to assume Apollos had been a source for some of Paul’s concern for the church.⁷

Divisions in the Church

Nearly every analysis of the letter faces first the issue of the divisions in the church at Corinth (1:10–17; 3:3–9). For some, these divisions are the primary occasion for this letter. Paul specifically mentions members of the church who see themselves as of Paul . . . of Apollos . . . of Cephas . . . of Christ (1:12).⁸ Although some commentators have tried to lay the blame for some problems at the feet of the Peter group and others at the feet of the Apollos group, in fact Paul never does that, and it is important to remember that the groups are not mentioned again as the source of the later problems that Paul confronts. Indeed, Johannes Munck in a major work on Paul entitled a chapter The Church without Factions because he rightly believed that interpreters had pressed these divisions too far.⁹

Furthermore, arguing that the groups of 1:12 provide the major occasion of this epistle tends to minimize other divisions within the church to which Paul pays significant attention. In chapter 8 Paul refers to some who are weak, as opposed to those he is obviously addressing at that point who might be called the strong (although he does not call them this in 1 Corinthians). Paul isolates a further division between rich and poor in his discussion of the Lord’s Supper (11:17–22). That division had led to an abuse of the Lord’s Supper. What is clear is that something had caused this church to divide itself up into groups at many points in the church’s life. However, it is important not to read into every situation that Paul addresses a particular group situation. For example, it is highly doubtful that 1 Corinthians 2 provides enough information to suggest that the problem of wisdom is fundamentally an issue concerning the group that followed Apollos.¹⁰ This conclusion is largely drawn from Acts 18:24, which says that Apollos was an eloquent man, well-versed in the scriptures (NRSV), while Paul apparently says almost the opposite of himself in 1 Corinthians 2:1.

Having said that the divisions of 1:12 can be overplayed, and acknowledging (see comments on 1:12) that there is no secure evidence of what this group or that group actually taught, it is still important to note that the divisions in the church are significant matters in this epistle and the unity of the church is high on Paul’s agenda as he writes. Paul is utterly dismayed at the splits and conflicts (1:10–11; 3:3; 11:18) among these Christians.

Integrity of the Epistle

The integrity of this epistle as we now have it has been challenged by some. The question has been raised largely due to Paul’s own mention of other letters he had written (1 Cor 5:9; 2 Cor 2:3–4, 7:8 refer to at least two other letters). Some commentators have suggested that the letters we now know as 1 and 2 Corinthians are in fact, to a lesser or greater degree, composite texts redacted to include parts of those other letters. Various apparent internal textual problems have been used as indications of places where texts may have been inserted or conflated. Some of the observed indications of textual redaction, it is said, include the following: 1) apparent breaks and sudden changes of subject (e.g., the lack of transition between the subjects of 1 Corinthians 8 and 9 and other such questions of transition especially notable in 2 Corinthians); 2) suggested difficulties that arise when the extant letters to Corinth are compared with the account in Acts 18 of Paul’s dealings with the church; 3) a supposed distinction between so-called rigorous and lenient passages (e.g., sections of 1 Corinthians 8–10); 4) a possible contradiction between 1 Corinthians 4:19 and 16:5–9; 5) questions regarding the links between the apostolic defense found in 1 Corinthians 4 and 9.¹¹ Some have then gone on to attempt to reconstruct the epistolary history and argue for which sections in the extant letters belong to which original correspondence. Whilst reconstructions of various complexities are found in commentators from J. Weiss (1910) onwards,¹² in 1948 Jean Héring sought to simplify matters, arguing for only two letters to be found in the extant 1 Corinthians. However, that work was dismissed by W. Schmithals in the presentation of one of the most complex reconstructions of all. Though Schmithals himself changed his mind over a number of years, in 1971 he argued for six pieces of correspondence between Paul and the Corinthians, parts of which are to be found in 1 and 2 Corinthians.¹³ Of Héring’s more simple analysis he said, To be sure, [it is] based on astoundingly narrow observation and is correspondingly superficial.¹⁴

The problem with all such hypotheses is that they are subjective. A hypothesis that seeks to respond to the textual issues such as those listed above without resort to literary and source criticism is to be preferred because it deals with the evidence already in hand. Conzelmann summarizes well the view taken in this commentary: There is no conclusive proof of different situations within 1 Corinthians. The existing breaks can be explained from the circumstances of its composition.¹⁵

Others have sought to address questions of internal integrity and continuity of argument within the extant epistles by positing sometimes complex reconstructions of Paul’s dialogue with the Corinthian church. One of the most detailed of these, found in the work of J. C. Hurd, may be mentioned here simply by way of example. He attempted to offer a total hypothesis concerning the origin, structure, and situation at Corinth and its related Pauline correspondence.¹⁶ He suggests that the apostolic decree (Acts 15) forced a compromise upon Paul that led him to change his position somewhat with regard to certain rights and freedoms. In his first visit, Paul had taught the Corinthians about wisdom and knowledge, but now in the light of the compromise Paul had to revisit his position. The Corinthians responded with anger and incomprehension. The main section from 7:1–11:1 deals with problems raised by the church. Verses that commentators believe are quotations from the Corinthian letter Hurd suggests are former Pauline sentences, which the Corinthians now quote back to him in disbelief that he seems to have changed his position. An example from chapters 8–10 reveals how Hurd’s thesis seeks to explain a number of matters. He suggests that in the founding mission (stage 1) Paul had preached 1) Christians have knowledge, 2) an idol is nothing, 3) there is no God but one, and 4) all things are lawful. In his conduct, Paul had eaten meat from the public market. Into this situation Paul then wrote the previous letter (stage 2) that said, Do not eat idol meat. Perplexed and annoyed, the Corinthians replied (stage 3) with the points already made by Paul: 1) But we have knowledge, 2) but an idol is nothing, etc. To this they added, Do you mean to say that we may not even buy meat in the market or eat with our friends? Paul’s response to this (stage 4) is to be found in 8:1–11:1: 1) yes, but knowledge puffs up, 2) yes, but there are so-called gods, 3) yes, but not all have this knowledge, 4) yes, but not all things build up. And regarding his conduct, he replied: Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? (9:1) and eat whatever is sold in the market or served at banquets (10:25).

This hypothetical reconstruction is attractive because it suggests a single original problem occasioning 1 Corinthians, that is, the previous letter (5:9). It also suggests the various problems were not random or disconnected matters, but issues Paul himself had raised in the previous letter. The problem with this reconstruction as with other similar attempts, however, is that it is not easy in the text itself to see where Pauline thought gives way to Corinthian thought. Since we actually do not have the previous letter, and the only thing we know for certain is that it addressed immorality in the church, the reconstruction becomes further and further removed from the text we actually possess. Hurd himself was no doubt correct when, commenting on his stage 2, he said, The further we venture from our text, 1 Corinthians, (stage 4), the more precarious becomes our investigation.¹⁷ But it must also be asked whether it is probable that Paul would have changed his view on substantive matters in such a short period of time. Moreover, Hurd’s reconstruction in effect requires a different dating of Paul’s life from that seen in Acts. For example, the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15) must be placed after Acts 18.

Various reconstructions of Paul’s correspondence with the Corinthians have been offered by some commentators with the purpose of attempting to help explain the progression of or aspects of Paul’s argument in the epistle. Hurd highlights for the reader some of the matters that do require explanation if we are to understand what Paul is saying and how it is to be interpreted. However, we believe along with most recent major commentaries¹⁸ that these can be explained from the progression of the epistle we have before us without resort to reconstructing an epistle we have never seen. Occasionally, and only where necessary, we tentatively reconstruct possible backgrounds for Paul’s comments as he interacts with the Corinthian church but seek to do so drawing on what he writes more broadly in the epistle itself.

Corinth: The City

Though inhabited fairly consistently during the Mycenaean civilization (ca. 1600–1100 BC), it was not until around 800 BC that the city of Corinth seems to have emerged again as a strong and wealthy cosmopolitan town. By 400 BC it was one of the largest Greek cities with perhaps about ninety-thousand inhabitants. However, in 146 BC it fell to Roman invaders, was completely destroyed,¹⁹ and was not reestablished until 44 BC when it was rebuilt by Julius Caesar. It was soon made the provincial capital of Greece and the seat of the Roman proconsul who governed the province of Achaia (27 BC). Gallio, mentioned in Acts 18:12–17, was one such proconsul. The city’s position on the isthmus connecting mainland Greece and the Roman province of Achaia (the modern Peloponnese) and its harbor and port provision for major shipping routes connecting Adriatic and Mediterranean trade led to its strategic importance and its general prosperity. Strabo describes it like this: Corinth is said to be prosperous because [it is] a place of commerce.²⁰ In terms of its economic status, Theissen draws attention to Corinth as a banking center and a center for production from artisans.²¹

Though the emperor Nero later started to build a canal, linking the two sides of the isthmus (at its widest point about four miles or 6.4 km), it was never completed,²² and in Paul’s day cargo may have been hauled by land between the two port cities of Cenchreae (Rom 16:1) to the east and Lechaeum to the north on an ancient stone pathway known as the diolkos.²³

The Social Context

By the time Paul arrived the city was composed of a mixed population of Greeks, numerous Romans, and many other arrivals from countries far and near. There may have been as many as one-hundred thousand inhabitants. It is therefore not surprising, as Bruce Winter reminds us, that the general social climate of the new city owed more to Rome than to Greece.²⁴ Even Corinthian architecture and city design imitated Rome with the temple dedicated to the emperor being of Roman design and raised above the level of others at the head of the forum.²⁵ Intriguingly, many inscriptions have been found in the excavations at Corinth, but virtually all from the time of the early church in Corinth are in Latin rather than Greek.²⁶

When Paul writes that not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth (1:26), he may well be reflecting upon the general social makeup of the city and not simply the church. The early Roman settlement of Corinth involved large numbers of freedmen,²⁷ that is, of former slaves who would have been relatively poor and, though coming largely from Rome itself, probably also came from places as far away as Egypt. One writer commenting on the city said this: What inhabitants, O luckless city, have you received, and in place of whom? Alas for the great calamity to Greece!²⁸ However, the implication of what Paul writes is that some were indeed wealthy. This was a city open to entrepreneurs like Paul and Priscilla and Aquila. It was no doubt a place where fortunes were made by some and lost by others, all contributing to a complex world in which social status took on great prominence.

In writing his letter to the Romans from Corinth, Paul sends these greetings in Romans 16:23: Gaius, who is host to me and to the whole church, greets you. Erastus, the city treasurer, and our brother Quartus, greet you (NRSV). (The same Erastus may be in mind also in 2 Tim 4:20.) It is possible that Paul draws attention to these men because they were important community leaders, and it is worth noting their Latin names. As a city official, this Erastus was probably reasonably wealthy. The name and person has taken on special significance after inscriptions were found near the theater in Corinth. One reads, "Erastus in return for aedileship²⁹ laid this stone at his own expense, and another inscription may point to the same man: The Vitelli, Frontinus, and Erastus [dedicate this] to. . . .³⁰ In 1 Corinthians the listing of names such as Chloe’s people," Fortunatus, Achaicus, and Stephanas, may also indicate wealthier Christian business people with wide-ranging business interests (1:11; 16:17). The flourishing trade of the city is revealed in excavations of the central square where several small shops have been discovered. It would have been a shop like these that Paul and Priscilla and Aquila may have shared in their tent making.

Along with the influx of the many tradesmen and seafarers, every two years the city hosted the Isthmian Games.³¹ This brought in many hundreds more people from far and wide and expanded business activity. Since it appears these games may have taken place during Paul’s residency in the city, his illustration of the athlete in 9:24–27 would be especially relevant. Murphy O’Connor suggests that these games ranked below the Olympic games but above the games at Delphi and Nemea (see comments on 9:24–26). All of this meant that even during Paul’s time this was a city growing in wealth and power and therefore was a vital place in which to establish the church of Christ. From here others would join the apostolic missionary enterprise and take the gospel far and wide.

It is likely that the tragic divisions between the wealthy and the poor, so noticeable in the eating of the Lord’s Supper (11:17–22), simply reflected the ways in which people of different socio-economic backgrounds would have treated each other in the city. Much as in the modern world, wealth and learning would have brought increased social status. As people moved up the social ladder, they would have left behind those less fortunate, turning their back on their previous status and embracing their newly found social status. Paul’s repeated concern in the epistle with the boasting of the elite is well understood against this background of society’s scramble for public recognition and honor.

In recent years much has been written about social stratification in Hellenistic society and about how this may have impinged on the matters faced by Paul in the Corinthian congregations. In the 1970s Gerd Theissen wrote a series of influential articles relating the social context of first-century Hellenism to Paul’s writings. One of the most significant starts with Paul’s own comments on the social makeup of the Corinthian church in 1:26–29 and then seeks to set this within a Hellenistic literary and social framework to elucidate the importance of social stratification in order to understand the people and problems he encountered.³² Another influential social description of the Hellenistic environment may be found in a volume by Wayne Meeks from 1983.³³ In many ways this set the scene for the more recent works referred to below in the commentary by Ben Witherington and Andrew Clarke.

Like most seaports today, Corinth was known for its immorality. Yet Corinth had a worse name than most. The name of the town even became a byword for sexual promiscuity, and to be a Corinthiastes was to be a profligate. There was even a proverb in both Greek and Latin: Not for everyman is the voyage to Corinth.³⁴ However, as far as may be determined, much of this reputation is from the earlier Greek city, and it is important not to read too much into the letter simply because at one stage it was a particularly immoral town. For example, the accounts drawn from Strabo, mentioned in some earlier commentaries, of the temple of Aphrodite having a thousand temple prostitutes are surely from a time before the Roman conquest of the town.³⁵ It would be anachronistic to imagine that when Paul addresses activity in idol temples in 1 Corinthians 10, he has in mind such practices. Even so, as we learn from his correspondence, immorality was a serious matter. Indeed, if the epistle to the Romans was written from Corinth, then the vices listed in Romans 1:18–32 no doubt were to be found in towns like Corinth.

The Religious Context

The social and religious contexts of the Corinth in which Paul had preached and to which he was writing can hardly be separated in the way the modern person might wish to do. Any society where religious practices so dominate the day-to-day life of citizens, as they did in the ancient Roman world, finds religion directly impinging on everything from trade to social acceptance and social status. A visitor walking down the main streets of any city in Paul’s day would have been reminded of the plurality of the gods worshipped in the Roman Empire. First, there were the pillars that lined most main streets every few meters. On top of these would have been representations of the famous and noble people, but also of gods. Then there were multiple temples and shrines in all Greek and Roman cities, with certain temples and their gods having higher status in the city than others. The statues of deities could differ from city to city. An example found in Scripture is the notable Ephesian worship of Diana (Artemis in the Greek pantheon). She was the patron god of that city, but was worshipped in most others. In Corinth, excavations have revealed numbers of temples both extensive and small in size.

As the Romans rebuilt the city, they both accommodated the ancient Greek gods and drew some into their own pantheon or effectively equated some of their own with the ancient Greek gods. They also gradually introduced the imperial cult. While the extent of emperor worship in the early AD 50s is not clear, statues and images of Augustus and later emperors have been found in the ruins of ancient Corinth, and the Roman temple at the head of the forum was dedicated to the emperor. Other temples evidenced in the environs of the city include those dedicated to the ancient Greek gods Apollo (god of healing and prophecy) and his twin sister, Artemis (Diana in the Roman pantheon). Asclepius, son of Apollo and god of medicine, was also worshipped, as was Aphrodite, the god of love (Venus in the Roman pantheon). Poseidon (Neptune), the god of the sea, unsurprisingly had a significant temple in this port area. Other temples included those dedicated to the female gods Kore (also called Persephone) and her daughter Demeter, and the Egyptian gods Serapis and Isis, representatives of the mystery cults. Some decades later Pausanias writing in the second-century AD speaks of having seen twenty-six places of worship in Corinth.³⁶ But this should not be seen as exceptional. In Acts 17:16 when the apostle Paul was in Athens, we read that his heart was provoked by a city full of idols. When he visited the Areopagus, Acts 17:21–22 makes it clear that those with whom he engaged in conversation were very religious and particularly interested in any novel talk of gods.

The pervasive nature of religion in every area of life meant that temples served as places where business people and tradespeople would network and encounter friends. Indeed, it would have been difficult to conduct business without considering the patron god. For example, the temple of Kore and Demeter and the Asclepius shrine both had a number of dining rooms. Early papyri offer examples of invitations to dinners, some in temple dining areas. In some examples, dinner invitations seem to be for nonreligious gatherings.³⁷ However, in others, the invitation is actually to dine in the temple of a god, or is even issued in the name of the god.³⁸ That the apostle had to face questions on how to behave in such a society was surely inevitable. Numerous questions relating to social gatherings in different contexts, religious and supposedly nonreligious, must have raised their heads as Christians sought to be a holy people in the midst of a world where, as Paul describes it in Romans 1:23, people had exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or birds or four-footed animals or reptiles (NRSV). The discussion in 1 Corinthians 8 and 10 of different approaches to different meals are well explained against this background.

It quickly becomes apparent in 1 Corinthians that Paul writes to those who were converted both from Judaism and paganism. The evidence for Jewish converts in the church is clear. He had preached first in the synagogue. His colleagues Priscilla and Aquila, among others, were Jews. Crispus, a leader in the synagogue, was the first convert (Acts 18:8; 1 Cor 1:14). Circumcised believers are also mentioned in 7:18. Paul also makes it clear that as he preached to the Jews [he] became as a Jew, in order to win Jews (9:20 NRSV). Part of a lintel has been found in the Corinthian excavations with the inscription synagogue of the Hebrews, which offers external evidence for what was probably a substantial Jewish community in the city. Philo also refers to this Jewish community in Corinth.³⁹ Meanwhile, there is also evidence for numbers of converted pagans. It is for them that Paul expresses most concern in 8:7. Some church members, probably those with roots in paganism, were being invited to meals with unbelievers. Some were prepared to enter idol temples (8:10), something that could hardly be imagined of those who had grown up in Judaism. Others, again most likely those with Roman or Greek roots rather than Jewish, were happy to take advantage of the local court system (6:1). Unbelievers, most probably pagans, seem to have been invited in or wandered in to watch the church at worship (14:24–25).

There is no doubt the previous religious convictions of those who made up the church would have added to the complexity of the issues Paul addresses. More generally, though, whether from a Greek or Jewish background, converts were being influenced by their surrounding society. Social aspirations and pride of status in society, mixed with the ever-present religious aspect to all social, political, and business intercourse, no doubt led to enormous temptations to compromise for the sake of community acceptance and belonging. Paul’s response is to point to Christ crucified, to the humility modeled at the cross, and to disciplined self-sacrifice for the gospel and for the sake of the holiness required of a people who must bring all glory to Christ the Lord.

In short, Paul’s opening sentences addressing the Corinthians as sanctified in Christ Jesus, as those called to be his holy people who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and as having a God who is faithful and will sustain them to the day of our Lord Jesus Christ reveal both Paul’s deep concern for a compromised people, but also the confident grounds for his hope (1 Cor 1:2–9). Their desire for status and their desire for acceptance and belonging must now all be found in Christ and in his church rather than in the values and attitudes of a self-obsessed, status-seeking, idolatrous paganism.

The Rhetorical and Literary Context

In recent years, much has been made of Paul’s use of forms of classical rhetoric in his writing. This is noted at various points in this commentary. However, before we touch on the literary and oratory context in which he writes, it must be remembered that in the text itself the apostle reminds the reader that he stands apart, not just from the content of what other teachers and philosophers of his generation were promoting, but also from the manner in which such messages were normally persuasively communicated to an audience. Thus, in 2:1 he says he came not with eloquence or human wisdom. He deliberately avoids certain sophistic conventions (see commentary on 2:1–5). Paul insists that the content of what he preaches, Christ crucified, and the manner in which he preaches must not be separated. Any power in what he says is due to God’s work and not his rhetoric. Nevertheless, it is clear that Paul writes with great care, occasionally using various epistolary and rhetorical conventions. Ben Witherington speaks of some of this as micro-rhetoric, by which he means the use of rhetorical devices within the NT documents—for instance the use of rhetorical questions, dramatic hyperbole, personification, amplification, irony, enthymemes (i.e., incomplete syllogisms), and the like.⁴⁰ However, as he readily admits, it is a different matter to go on to claim, as he and others have done recently, that a letter like 1 Corinthians may exhibit all or some of the characteristics of the formal rhetorical divisions of ancient speeches.

Aristotle’s work Rhetorica is the oldest full treatise on rhetoric and influenced the whole Graeco-Roman period. In the first-century AD, Quintilian’s Institutio oratoria⁴¹ provides us with a detailed description of the principles of rhetoric and its pervasive influence in the Roman Empire. Quintilian refers to rhetoric as the good man, speaking well.⁴² The three different categories of ancient speech rhetoric include: 1) forensic or judicial rhetoric, which was used both to accuse and to defend in legal cases and largely focused on past events; 2) deliberative rhetoric which, focusing largely on the future, was used widely in political debate to persuade an audience either toward or against some particular action; 3) epideictic or ceremonial rhetoric, which focused on the present and was frequently used in public gatherings to eulogize a person, whether in a funeral or for some city honor. These broader types of rhetoric could be further broken down into six divisions: the exordium, the narratio, the propositio, the probatio, the refutatio, and the peroratio.

Of special note with regard to the analysis of 1 Corinthians in terms of formal rhetoric is Margaret Mitchell’s work on the epistle. This is a masterful contribution to the exegesis of the epistle and offers another strong argument in favor of viewing the letter as a single unit. However, her insistence that the epistle is throughout a deliberative argument for church unity probably overstates the matter and perhaps especially overemphasizes Paul’s quest for church unity as the primary driving force of his argument.⁴³ More recently Bruce Winter has sought to locate Paul’s correspondence in an opposition to the broader philosophical and rhetorical context of the sophistic movement.⁴⁴ His work also analyzes texts in 1 Corinthians in terms of their rhetorical character and seeks to demonstrate how Paul (and Philo) interacted with the movement, both countering it—specially by reference to the Old Testament—and yet also adopting some of its method.

In this commentary Paul’s use of rhetorical devices are noted in a number of places. The possibility of viewing chapter 15 as a good example of deliberative rhetoric is commented upon, as is the advantage of seeing chapter 13 as an example of epideictic rhetoric. Beyond this, though, we believe the text functions more broadly than other examples of extended deliberative rhetoric and that viewing it solely in this way overly restricts the content and varied personal and corporate applications Paul provides in the letter. This lengthy letter, though undoubtedly read aloud to the church, is above all a personal communication and, in style, far from a piece of persuasive public oratory.

This epistle should primarily be read for what it is, a letter. Numbers of ancient letters are available for comparison, and certainly this sits well within the accepted norms of letter writing of Paul’s day, although his is a much longer letter than other examples available to us. While Hellenistic epistolary conventions are briefly noted in the exegesis below, they are of little help in interpretation beyond the conventions of letter introductions and conclusions. The introduction and conclusion of this letter largely follow those conventions. Thus, in the introduction the name of the correspondent is given and the addressee is mentioned, followed by greetings and sometimes a thanksgiving for the one to whom the letter is written. In the conclusion, contemporary letters may include travel plans, but they almost always include further greetings, an autograph, and a final blessing. As noted in the commentary, Paul made use of these conventions but clearly adapted them to his Christian intent.

Interpreting 1 Corinthians: One Underlying Problem?

Given that it is difficult to say with any certainty that the group divisions give rise to most of the content of this epistle,⁴⁵ there is a need to ask whether some other underlying problem might provide a coherent understanding of the occasion for this epistle. The attempts at historical reconstruction have sought to do this but become too speculative. In reading this epistle, four main alternatives present themselves. The first two have been noted above, namely, that either the underlying problem is to be found in the four groups of 1:12, or that the problem may lie in Paul’s own dealings with the Corinthians and their misunderstanding of his position, or the change in his position (as per Hurd).

A third view sees the letter largely as a loose arrangement of a number of basically unrelated problems with which Paul feels he has to deal. Then, fourthly, it is suggested that there probably was some underlying theological matter that had led to much wrong thinking and many wrong practices. The problems with the first and second possibilities have been noted. The idea that the epistle is an arrangement of basically unrelated ideas gives a dissatisfying picture of the church as a whole and fails to do justice to several themes that do recur, several of which are laid out in the opening few verses. If each problem is unconnected, we are also left with a view that Paul made an incredible mess of his eighteen months of teaching there.

It has been noted above that more recent commentators have tended to examine this epistle and interpret it in the light of its literary form and the social and religious milieu in which it was written. However, it is worth noting briefly how modern interpretation has drawn upon and yet also moved on from earlier work. Before the nineteenth century, scholars usually viewed the epistle as a response to a series of different issues connected by two factors: 1) the desire of Satan to split a church, and 2) leaders who had been corrupted by a desire for prominence.⁴⁶ In the nineteenth century, however, commentators sought to reconstruct the historical situation in Corinth in the attempt to find a common factor behind these individual problems. Thus, in 1831 F. C. Baur attempted to define the characteristics of the parties mentioned in 1:12. He argued that two groups existed in the church: the one being Paul/ Apollos and the other Christ/Peter. He believed that Paul faced Judaizers in Corinth as he had done in Galatia. The attacks on Paul were seen, then, as a new step in the Judaism/Paulinism controversy.⁴⁷ While, as we noted above, there are places that indicate Paul’s congregation was partly Jewish, the fact that Jewish problems did arise does not necessitate the presence of a Judaizing group.⁴⁸ Further, there is no evidence of an ongoing battle of such proportions between a Pauline and Petrine Christianity as Baur’s reconstruction requires.⁴⁹ Many at the end of the nineteenth century expressed dissatisfaction with Baur’s thesis. In connection with 1 Corinthians, Godet claimed that some Hellenistic influence was present among Paul’s opponents, but he still viewed the Christ-party as Judaizers, arguing that nothing authorizes us to ascribe to Peter a conception of the Gospel opposed to that of Paul.⁵⁰ The Peter party was distinct and conceded more liberty than the legalists in the Christ party, but even the rigorists were