PROBLEMS OF A GENTILE CHURCH
Christianity, according to Paul, is an escape from the world. Gal. 1:4. All human distinctions are comparatively unimportant. "There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female." Gal. 3:28. Such a doctrine might seem logically to lead to fanaticism. If the Christian is already a citizen of heaven, may he not be indifferent to the conditions of life upon this earth? Such a conclusion was altogether avoided by Paul. In First Corinthians Paul is revealed as the most practical of men. All human distinctions are subordinate and secondary—and yet these distinctions are carefully observed. Paul was a man of heroic faith, but he was also possessed of admirable tact.
It is not that the one side of Paul's nature limited the other; it is not that common sense acted as a check to transcendental religion. On the contrary, the two things seemed to be in perfect harmony. Just because Paul was inwardly so entirely free from the world, he was also so wise in dealing with worldly affairs. The secret of this harmony was consecration. Human relationships, when consecrated to God, are not destroyed, but ennobled. They cease, indeed, to be an end in themselves, but they become a means to Christian service. The Christian man has no right to be indifferent to the world. If he is, he is no true son of the God who made the world, and sent the Lord to save it. The Christian, like the man of the world, is profoundly interested in the conditions of life on this earth. Only, unlike the man of the world, he is not helpless and perplexed in the presence of those conditions; but from his vantage ground of heavenly power, he shapes them to the divine will. He is interested in the world, but he is interested in it, not as its servant, but as its master.
So in First Corinthians Paul lays hold of certain perplexing practical problems with the sure grasp of one who is called to rule and not to serve. Everything that he touches he lifts to a higher plane. In his hands even the simplest things of life receive a heavenly significance.
The problems that are discussed in First Corinthians stood in a special relation to the environment of the Corinthian church. Most of them were due to the threatened intrusions of Greek paganism. They are closely analogous, however, to the problems which we have to solve to-day. Paganism and worldliness are not dead. The Church still stands in the midst of a hostile environment. We can still use the teaching of Paul. That teaching will now be examined in a few of its important details.
1. THE PARTIES
Paul mentions four parties that had been formed in the Corinthian church—a Paul-party, an Apollos-party, a Cephas-party and a Christ-party. These parties do not seem to have been separated from one another by any serious doctrinal differences, and it is impossible to determine their characteristics in detail. In the section where the party spirit is discussed, Paul blames the Corinthians for intellectual pride. This fault has often been connected with the Apollos-party. Apollos was an Alexandrian, and probably had an Alexandrian Greek training. He might therefore have unconsciously evoked among some members of the Corinthian church an excessive admiration for his more pretentious style of preaching, which might have caused them to despise the simpler manner of Paul. Even this much, however, is little more than surmise. At any rate, Apollos should not be blamed for the faults of those who misused his name. He is praised unstintedly by Paul, who was even desirous that he should return at once to Corinth. I Cor. 16:12. Paul blames the Paul-party just as much as any of the other three.
The Peter-party was composed of admirers of Peter, who had either come to Corinth from the scene of Peter's labors elsewhere, or simply had known of Peter by hearsay. It is unlikely that Peter himself had been in Corinth, for if he had Paul would probably have let the fact appear in First or Second Corinthians. The Christ-party is rather puzzling. A comparison with the false teachers who are combated in Second Corinthians has led some scholars to suppose that it was a Judaizing party, which emphasized a personal acquaintance with the earthly Jesus as a necessary qualification of apostleship. In that case, however, Paul would probably have singled out the Christ-party for special attack. More probably these were simply men who, in proud opposition to the adherents of Paul, of Apollos and of Cephas, emphasized their own independence of any leader other than Christ. Of course, the watchword, "I am of Christ," if used in a better spirit, would have been altogether praiseworthy, and indeed Paul desires all the parties to unite in it. I Cor. 3:21-23.
Perhaps it is a mistake to attribute to these parties anything like stability. On the whole, the passage gives the impression that it is not the individual parties that Paul is condemning, but the party spirit. That party spirit was manifested by watchwords like those which are enumerated in I Cor. 1:12, but that that enumeration was meant to be complete, does not appear. The whole effort to determine the characteristics of the individual parties—an effort which has absorbed the attention of many scholars—should perhaps be abandoned.
Paul's treatment of the party spirit exhibits his greatness not only as an administrator, but also as a writer. The subject was certainly not inspiring; yet under Paul's touch it becomes luminous with heavenly glory. The contrast of human wisdom with the message of the cross, I Cor. 1:18-31, where a splendid rhythm of language matches the sublimity of the thought, the wonderful description of the freedom and power of the man who possesses the Spirit of God, the grand climax of the third chapter, "For all things are yours; whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours; and ye are Christ's; and Christ is God's"—these are among the passages that can never be forgotten.
2. THINGS SACRIFICED TO IDOLS
The question of meats offered to idols, which Paul discusses in I Cor. 8:1 to 11:1, was exceedingly intricate. To it Paul applies several great principles. In the first place, there is the principle of Christian freedom. The Christian has been delivered from enslaving superstitions. Idols have no power; they cannot impart any harmful character to the good things which God has provided for the sustenance of man. In the second place, however, there is the principle of loyalty. The fact that idols are nothing does not render idol-worship morally indifferent. On the contrary, idolatry is always sinful. If the eating of certain kinds of food under certain conditions involves participation in idolatry then it is disloyalty to the one true God. The joint operation of the two principles of freedom and of loyalty seems to lead in Paul's mind to the following practical conclusion:—The Christian may eat the meat that has been offered to idols if it is simply put on sale in the market place or set before him at an ordinary meal; but he must not take part with the heathen in specifically religious feasts. The whole question, however, is further viewed in the light of a third principle—the principle of Christian love. Even things that are in themselves innocent must be given up if a brother by them is led into conduct which for him is sin. Christ has died for that weaker brother; surely the Christian, then, may not destroy him. Thus love, even more than loyalty, limits freedom—but it is a blessed limitation. The principles here applied by Paul to the question of the Corinthian Christians will solve many a problem of the modern Church.
3. SPIRITUAL GIFTS
The principle of Christian love, with the related principle of toleration, is applied also to another set of problems, the problems with regard to the exercise of spiritual gifts. The passage in which Paul discusses these problems, aside from its spiritual and moral teaching, is of singular historical interest. It affords a unique picture of the devotional meetings of an apostolic church. The characteristic of these meetings was the enthusiasm which prevailed in them. Paul is not at all desirous of dampening that enthusiasm. On the contrary the gifts in question were in his judgment really bestowed by the Holy Spirit. Even the gift of tongues, which Paul limits in its operation, is in his judgment of genuine value. Indeed, he himself had exercised it even more than the other Christians. I Cor. 14:18. This last fact should correct any unworthy impression which we might have formed with regard to the gift. If speaking with tongues was practiced by Paul, then it was no mere unhealthy emotionalism. We are to-day unable to understand it fully, but in the apostolic Church it was a real expression of Christian experience.
Paul desires, not to dampen the enthusiasm of the Corinthian church, but merely to eliminate certain harmful by-products of that which was in itself altogether excellent. The first principle which he applies is the principle of toleration. There is room in the Church for many different kinds of workers. "There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit." The principle is often neglected in the modern Church. Toleration, indeed, is on everyone's lips; but it is not the kind of toleration that Paul means. It is often nothing more than indifference to the great verities of the faith. Such toleration would have met with nothing but an anathema from Paul. The toleration that Paul is commending is a toleration, not with regard to matters of doctrine, but with regard to methods of work. Such toleration is often sadly lacking. Some advocates of missions think that almost every Christian who stays at home is a coward; some good, conservative elders, on the other hand, have little interest in what passes the bounds of their own congregation. Some Christians of reserved habits are shocked at the popular methods of the evangelists; some evangelists are loud in their ignorant denunciation of the Christian scholar. In other words, many very devout Christians of the present day act as though they had never read the twelfth chapter of First Corinthians.
The principle of toleration, however, culminates in the principle of love. If there must be a choice between the exercise of different gifts, then the choice should be in favor of those gifts which are most profitable to other men. Finally, even the highest spiritual gifts are not independent of reason. I Cor. 14:32,33. That is a far-reaching principle. Some modern Christians seem to think that an appeal to the inward voice of the Spirit excuses them from listening to reasonable counsel. Such is not the teaching of Paul.
4. THE RESURRECTION
The error which is combated in the fifteenth chapter of the epistle could hardly have been a denial, in general, of continued existence after death, but was rather a denial of the resurrection of the body as over against the Greek doctrine of the immortality of the soul. In reply, Paul appeals to the resurrection of Jesus. The appeal would seem to be futile unless Paul means that the resurrection of Jesus was a bodily resurrection. If the appearances of Jesus were no more than incorporeal manifestations of his spirit, then obviously the believer in a mere immortality of the soul remained unrefuted. In this chapter there is an advance over the simple teaching of First Thessalonians. Here the character of the resurrection body comes into view. The resurrection body will have a real connection with the old body—otherwise there would be no resurrection—but the weakness of the old body will be done away. There is continuity, but also transformation.
5. INCIDENTAL INFORMATION ABOUT JESUS
Certain passages in First Corinthians, which are introduced only in an incidental way, as illustrations of the principles which are being applied, are of inestimable historical value. These passages include not only the great autobiographical passage in the ninth chapter, where Paul illustrates from his own life the limitation of the principle of freedom by the principle of love, but also two all-important passages which refer to the life of Christ.
It is generally admitted that First Corinthians was written at about A. D. 55. The eleventh chapter of the epistle gives an account of the institution of the Lord's Supper, in which Jesus teaches the sacrificial significance of his death; and the fifteenth chapter gives a list of the appearances of Jesus after his resurrection. The information contained in these passages was not invented by Paul; indeed he distinctly says that it was "received." In A. D. 55, then, not only Paul, but also the Church generally believed that Jesus' death, according to his own teaching, was sacrificial, and appealed in support of his resurrection to a wealth of competent testimony. But from whom had Paul "received" these things? Hardly from anyone except those who had been Christians before him—in other words, from the Palestinian church. We have here an irremovable confirmation of the Gospel view of Jesus. First Corinthians is a historical document of absolutely priceless value.
The incidental character of these historical passages is especially noteworthy. It shows that Paul knew far more about Jesus than he found occasion in the epistles to tell. If he had told more, no doubt the Gospel picture of Jesus would have received confirmation throughout.
In the Library.—Purves, "Christianity in the Apostolic Age," pp. 213-221. Davis, "Dictionary of the Bible": article on "Apollos"; Purves and Davis, article on "Corinthians, Epistles to the." Hastings, "Dictionary of the Bible": Robertson, article on "Corinthians, First Epistle to the." M'Clymont, "The New Testament and Its Writers," pp. 58-64. Ellicott, "A New Testament Commentary for English Readers," vol. ii, pp. 281-356: Shore, "The First Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians." "The Cambridge Bible for Schools": Lias, "The First Epistle to the Corinthians." Zahn, "Introduction to the New Testament," vol. i, pp. 256-306. "The International Critical Commentary": Robertson and Plummer, "A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the First Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians." The two last-named works presuppose a knowledge of Greek.