@1Co 5:1-13. THE INCESTUOUS PERSON AT CORINTH: THE CORINTHIANS REPROVED FOR CONNIVANCE, AND WARNED TO PURGE OUT THE BAD LEAVEN. QUALIFICATION OF HIS FORMER COMMAND AS TO ASSOCIATION WITH SINNERS OF THE WORLD.
1. commonly--rather, "actually" [ALFORD]. Absolutely
[BENGEL]. "It
is reported," implies, that the Corinthians, though they "wrote"
(@1Co 7:1) to Paul on other points, gave him no information on those
things which bore against themselves. These latter matters reached the
apostle indirectly (@1Co 1:11).
so much as named--The oldest manuscripts and authorities omit "named":
"Fornication of such a gross kind as (exists) not even among the
heathen, so that one (of you) hath (in concubinage) his father's wife,"
that is, his stepmother, while his father is still alive (@2Co 7:12;
compare @Le 18:8). She was perhaps a heathen, for which reason he
does not direct his rebuke against her (compare @1Co 5:12,13).
ALFORD thinks "have" means have in marriage: but the connection is
called "fornication," and neither Christian nor Gentile law would
have sanctioned such a marriage, however Corinth's notorious
profligacy might wink at the concubinage.
2. puffed up--with your own wisdom and knowledge, and the eloquence
of your favorite teachers: at a time when ye ought to be "mourning" at
the scandal caused to religion by the incest. Paul mourned because
they did not mourn (@2Co 2:4). We ought to mourn over the
transgressions of others, and repent of our own (@2Co 12:21)
[BENGEL].
that--ye have not felt such mourning as would lead to the result
that, &c.
taken away from among you--by excommunication. The incestuous person
was hereby brought to bitter repentance, in the interval between the
sending of the first and second Epistles (@2Co 2:5-10). Excommunication
in the Christian Church corresponded to that in the Jewish synagogue, in
there being a lighter and heavier form: the latter an utter separation
from church fellowship and the Lord's house, the former exclusion from
the Lord's Supper only but not from the Church.
3. as absent--The best manuscripts read, "being absent."
present in spirit--(@2Ki 5:26 Col 2:5).
so done--rather, "perpetrated," as the Greek word here is stronger
than that for "done" in @1Co 5:2. "So," that is, so scandalously while
called a brother.
4. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ--By His authority and as representing His person and will (@2Co 2:10). Join this with "to deliver such a one unto Satan" (@1Co 5:5). The clause, "When ye have been gathered together and my spirit (wherein I am 'present,' though 'absent in body,' @1Co 5:3), with the power of our Lord Jesus," stands in a parenthesis between. Paul speaking of himself uses the word "spirit"; of Christ, "power." Christ's power was promised to be present with HIS Church "gathered together in His name" (@Mt 18:18-20): and here Paul by inspiration gives a special promise of his apostolic spirit, which in such cases was guided by the Holy Spirit, ratifying their decree passed according to his judgment ("I have judged," @1Co 5:3), as though he were present in person (@Joh 20:21-23 2Co 13:3-10). This power of infallible judgment was limited to the apostles; for they alone had the power of working miracles as their credentials to attest their infallibility. Their successors, to establish their claim to the latter, must produce the former (@2Co 12:2). Even the apostles in ordinary cases, and where not specially and consciously inspired, were fallible (@Ac 8:13,23 Ga 2:11-14).
5. Besides excommunication (of which the Corinthians themselves had
the power), Paul delegates here to the Corinthian Church his own
special power as an apostle, of inflicting corporeal disease or death in
punishment for sin ("to deliver to Satan such an one," that is, so
heinous a sinner). For instances of this power, see
@Ac 5:1-11 13:11 1Ti 1:20. As Satan receives power at times to try
the godly, as Job (@Job 2:4-7) and Paul
(@2Co 12:7; compare also as to Peter, @Lu 22:31),
much more the ungodly. Satan, the
"accuser of the brethren" (@Re 12:10) and the "adversary"
(@1Pe 5:8), demands the sinner for punishment on
account of sin (@Zec 3:1). When
God lets Satan have his way, He is said to "deliver the sinner unto
Satan" (compare @Ps 109:6). Here it is not finally; but for the
affliction of the body with disease, and even death (@1Co 11:30,32),
so as to destroy fleshly lust. He does not say,
"for the destruction of the body," for it shall share in
redemption (@Ro 8:23); but of the corrupt "flesh" which "cannot
inherit the kingdom of God," and the lusts of which had prompted this
offender to incest (@Ro 7:5 8:9,10). The "destruction of the flesh"
answers to "mortify the deeds of the body" (@Ro 8:13), only
that the latter is done by one's self, the former is effected by
chastisement from God (compare @1Pe 4:6):
the spirit . . . saved--the spiritual part of man, in the believer
the organ of the Holy Spirit. Temporary affliction often leads to
permanent salvation (@Ps 83:16).
6. Your glorying in your own attainments and those of your favorite
teachers (@1Co 3:21 4:19 5:2), while all the while ye connive at
such a scandal, is quite unseemly.
a little leaven leaveth . . . whole lump--(@Ga 5:9), namely, with
present complicity in the guilt, and the danger of future contagion
(@1Co 15:33 2Ti 2:17).
7. old leaven--The remnant of the "old" (@Eph 4:22-24) heathenish
and natural corruption. The image is taken from the extreme care of the
Jews in searching every corner of their houses, and "purging out" every
particle of leaven from the time of killing the lamb before the Passover
(@De 16:3,4). So Christians are continually to search and purify
their hearts (@Ps 139:23,24).
as ye are unleavened--normally, and as far as your Christian calling
is concerned: free from the leaven of sin and death (@1Co 6:11). Paul
often grounds exhortations on the assumption of Christian professors'
normal state as realized (@Ro 6:3,4)
[ALFORD]. Regarding the
Corinthian Church as the Passover "unleavened lump" or mass, he entreats
them to correspond in fact with this their normal state. "For Christ our
Passover (@Ex 12:5-11,21-23 Joh 1:29) has been
(English Version, "is") sacrificed for us"; that is, as the Jews
began the days of unleavened bread with the slaying of the Passover
lamb, so, Christ our Passover having been already slain, let there
be no leaven of evil in you who are the "unleavened lump." Doubtless he
alludes to the Passover which had been two or three weeks before kept by
the Jewish Christians (@1Co 16:8): the Gentile Christians probably
also refraining from leavened bread at the love-feasts. Thus the Jewish
Passover naturally gave place to our Christian Easter. The time however,
of keeping feast (metaphorical; that is,
leading the Christian life of joy in Christ's finished work, compare
@Pr 15:15) among us Christians, corresponding to the Jewish Passover,
is not limited, as the latter, to one season, but is ALL our time; for
the transcendent benefits of the once-for-all completed sacrifice of
our Passover Lamb extends to all the time of our lives and of this
Christian dispensation; in no part of our time is the leaven of evil to
be admitted.
For even--an additional reason, besides that in @1Co 5:6, and a
more cogent one for purging out every leaven of evil; namely, that
Christ has been already sacrificed, whereas the old leaven is yet
unremoved, which ought to have been long ago purged out.
8. not . . . old leaven--of our unconverted state as Jews or heathen.
malice--the opposite of "sincerity," which allows no leaven of evil to
be mixed up with good (@Mt 16:6).
wickedness--the opposite of "truth," which allows not evil to be
mistaken for good. The Greek for "malice" means the evil habit of mind; "wickedness," the outcoming of the
same in word and deed. The
Greek for "sincerity" expresses literally, a thing which, when examined
by the sun's light, is found pure and unadulterated.
9. I wrote . . . in an epistle--rather, "in the Epistle": a former one not now extant. That Paul does not refer to the present letter is proved by the fact that no direction "not to company with fornicators" occurs in the previous part of it; also the words, "in an (or, the) epistle," could not have been added if he meant, "I have just written" (@2Co 10:10). "His letters" (plural; not applying to merely one) confirm this. @2Co 7:8 also refers to our first Epistle, just as here a former letter is referred to by the same phrase. Paul probably wrote a former brief reply to inquiries of the Corinthians: our first Epistle, as it enters more fully into the same subject, has superseded the former, which the Holy Spirit did not design for the guidance of the Church in general, and which therefore has not been preserved. See my Introduction.
10. Limitation of the prohibition alluded to in @1Co 5:9. As in dissolute Corinth to "company with no fornicators," &c. would be almost to company with none in the (unbelieving) world; ye need not utterly ("altogether") forego intercourse with fornicators, &c., of the unbelieving world (compare @1Co 10:27 Joh 17:15 1Jo 5:18,19). As "fornicators" sin against themselves, so "extortioners" against their neighbors, and "idolaters" against God. The attempt to get "out of the world," in violation of God's will that believers should remain in it but keep themselves from its evil, led to monasticism and its consequent evils.
11. But now--"Now" does not express time, but
"the case being so," namely, that to avoid fornicators, &c.,
of the world, you would have to leave the world altogether, which
would be absurd. So "now" is used in @Heb 11:16. Thus we avoid
making the apostle now retract a command which he had before given.
I have written--that is, my meaning in the letter I wrote was "not
to keep company," &c.
a brother--contrasted with a "fornicator . . . of the world"
(@1Co 5:10). There is less danger in associating with open worldlings
than with carnal professors. Here, as in @Eph 5:3,5, "covetousness"
is joined with "fornication": the common fount of both being "the fierce
and ever fiercer longing of the creature, which has turned from God, to
fill itself with the inferior objects of sense"
[TRENCH, Greek Synonyms of the New Testament]. Hence "idolatry" is
associated with them: and the covetous man is termed an "idolater"
(@Nu 25:1,2). The Corinthians did not fall into open idolatry, but
ate things offered to idols, so making a compromise with the heathen;
just as they connived at fornication. Thus this verse prepares for the
precepts in @1Co 8:4, &c. Compare the similar case of fornication,
combined with a similar idolatrous compromise, after the pattern of
Israel with the Midianites (@Re 2:14).
no not to eat--not to sit at the same table with such; whether at the
love-feasts (agapæ) or in private intercourse, much more at the
Lord's table: at the last, too often now the guests "are not as children
in one family, but like a heterogeneous crowd of strangers in an inn"
[BENGEL] (compare @Ga 2:12 2Jo 1:10:11).
12. what have I to do--You might have easily understood that my concern
is not with unbelievers outside the Church, but that I referred to
those within it.
also--Implying, Those within give me enough to do without those
outside.
do not ye, &c.--Ye judge your fellow citizens, not strangers: much
more should I [BENGEL]. Rather, Is it not your duty to judge them
that are within? God shall judge them that are without: do you look
at home [GROTIUS]. God is the Judge of the salvation of the heathen, not
we (@Ro 2:12-16). Paul here gives an anticipatory censure of their
going to law with saints before heathen tribunals, instead of judging
such causes among themselves within.
13. put away from among yourselves that wicked--Sentence of excommunication in language taken from @De 24:7.