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1 CORINTHIANS 10 – COMMENTARY

v.2 “The Israelites were not immersed in literal water; baptism here suggests identification with and allegiance to the leader of a spiritual community.”[1]

v.4 “for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them.  Paul comes to the notion of the rock ‘following’ them very readily because he notices that the location of the rock, as told in different passages in his scriptures (Psalm 78:16 supposes it happened more than once; Exodus 17:1-6; Numbers 20:2-13), is always with God’s people but is mentioned first in one place and then in another and so forth.  Philo, another Jew who was contemporary with Paul, identified the rock as Wisdom, who, thus personified, never abandoned God’s people.”[2]

vv.6-10 “Paul explains here that all these things were examples (typoi) for us to think about, lest we who also have received the covenant blessings should become displeasing to God by lusting after evil things as Israel did.

“Then he describes (vv.7-10) what that lusting involved and warns against following their example. Many of Israel became idolaters. The illustration is that of Exodus 32:1-6, where it is said that Israel had Aaron make the golden calf. Exodus 32:6, quoted here, tells how Israel ate a sacrificial meal in dedication to the calf and then got up ‘to play’ (KJV), that is, to dance in ceremonial revelry as the pagans danced before their gods. This may look back to Paul’s discussion in 1 Corinthians 8 about meat sacrificed to idols.[3]

vv.11-13 “Paul now makes an application for the Corinthians. Paul sets forth the examples he uses as actually having occurred in history (notice the imperfect verb sunebainen, ‘they were happening’) and as having been written down to warn us. The KJV translation ‘ends of the world’ (v.11b) seems to suggest too much, as though Paul thought he and the Corinthians were in the time of the Second Coming. Actually, he is speaking of the stretch of time called ‘the fulfillment’ [or ‘end’] of the ages, which was to continue from Paul’s time into the indefinite future. The warning amounts to this: Do not be smug in your firm stand for Christ. Keep alert lest you fall. [4]

v.12 “Paul invites his readers to evaluate or test themselves by making a comparison with the characters in the Exodus story.  Like their wandering predecessors, they share in the benefits that God has provided and they are guided and nurtured by God.  But they must be careful not to comport themselves, like ‘most’ of their forebears, as persons who are tempted to idolatry and immorality and thus put God to the test.”[5]

“Self-testing can give an occasion for realignment, for reorientation, in which one can make certain to steer clear of sexual immorality, idolatry, and a testing of God.  By altering one’s course on the basis of self-examination, one can choose to stand with the exodus forebears who were faithful rather than fall like those who tested God.”[6]

v.13“The ‘yous’ in the text are both in the plural, meaning that the experience of the testing and the efforts at handling it are never presumed by Paul to be borne by an individual alone.  Paul’s assumption is that any testing you experience is never in isolation. […]  And the bearing of the test, the handling of it, is never supposed by Paul to be done by an isolated individual; others will always be bearing it with the one who is tested.  So the text supposes that God will not test us beyond what all of us can bear together.  Paul’s outlook stands in sharp contrast with the modern tendency to privatize and individualize all religious matters and experiences, even including suffering.”[7]

vv.14-15 “The apostle’s terse injunction, ‘Flee [present tense] from idolatry,’ applies not only to the weak who through eating might be led into idolatry but also to those with a strong conscience who in leading the weak into sin were guilty. Paul asks the Corinthians to use good sense and determine the truth of what he says.”[8]

v.16 “For Paul, participation in the Lord’s supper is the fundamental, even defining, community action of believers.  Like no other activity, this fellowship epitomizes believers’ relation to Christ and to one another in pristine clarity.  Cup and bread are the focal symbols.  Koinonia (‘association,’ ‘partnership,’ ‘sharing,’ ‘fellowship,’) and related terminology (‘take part in,’ ‘have a share in’) lace this pericope and ground Paul’s basic supposition that participation and sharing in Christ and the resulting fellowship is exclusively defining.  It sets limits and boundaries that exclude any and all other rival participations.”[9]

v.18 “As we have seen, when sacrifice was offered, part of the meat was given back to the worshipper to hold a feast.  At such a feast it was always held that the god himself was a guest.  More, it was often held that, after the meat had been sacrificed, the god himself was in it and that at the banquet he entered into the very bodies and spirits of those who ate.  Just as an unbreakable bond was forged between two men if they ate each other’s bread and salt, so a sacrificial meal formed a real communion between the god and his worshipper.  The person who sacrificed was in a real sense a sharer with the altar; he had a mystic communion with the god.”[10]

vv.20  “and I do not want you to be participants with demons  There was a time when it was fashionable for biblical scholars and theologians—working in a cultural climate influenced by optimistic rationalism—to discount belief in ‘demons’ as antiquated superstition.  By the end of the twentieth century [sic], however, anyone who does not believe in the power of evil afoot in the world is simply closing his or her eyes to the evidence of our times.”[11]

v.23-11:1 “The question of temple dining and eating food sacrificed to idols is now left aside as Paul addresses the matter of food of questionable origins—food that may have been sacrificed to idols before it comes into the hands of a believer.  To answer the question of how a Christian can act with integrity in a world brimming with idols, he moves from an absolute prohibition based on general arguments about the dangers of associating with anything idolatrous to conditional liberty based on the biblical tenet that the earth is the Lord’s and everything in it (10:26; Psalms 24:1).”[12]

11:1 “The imitation of Christ is, therefore, focused on the cross.  This is precisely what the Corinthians were failing to perceive in their quest to affirm personal freedoms for themselves.  Paul seeks throughout this section to impress upon them that life in the church is life in fellowship with those weak ones for whom Christ died.”[13]

[1] Craig L. Blomberg, 1 Corinthians, NIV Life Application Commentary Series (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1995) 191.

[2] J. Paul Sampley, “First Corinthians”, New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol.X  (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002)  915.

[3] Frank E. Gaebelein, Gen. Ed. Expositor’s Bible Commentary CD, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992) notes for 1 Corinthians.

[4] Frank E. Gaebelein, Gen. Ed. Expositor’s Bible Commentary CD, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992) notes for 1 Corinthians.

[5] J. Paul Sampley, “First Corinthians”, New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol.X  (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002)  914.

[6] J. Paul Sampley, “First Corinthians”, New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol.X  (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002)  914.

[7] J. Paul Sampley, “First Corinthians”, New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol.X  (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002)  916.

[8] Frank E. Gaebelein, Gen. Ed. Expositor’s Bible Commentary CD, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1992) notes for 1 Corinthians.

[9] J. Paul Sampley, “First Corinthians”, New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol.X  (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2002)  917-918.

[10] William Barclay, Letters to the Corinthians, The Daily Study Bible Series (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1975) 91.

[11] Richard B. Hays, First Corinthians, Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville,KY: John Knox Press, 1997) 172.

[12] Craig L. Blomberg, 1 Corinthians, NIV Life Application Commentary Series (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1995) 607.

[13] Richard B. Hays, First Corinthians, Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville,KY: John Knox Press, 1997) 181.

BIBLE TEXT: 1 Corinthians 10:1-13 (ESV)

¹ For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, ² and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, ³ and all ate the same spiritual food, ⁴ and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. ⁵ Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.

⁶ Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. ⁷ Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” ⁸ We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. ⁹ We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, ¹⁰ nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. ¹¹ Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. ¹² Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. ¹³ No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

God [What truths about God’s person, activity or character does the text reveal?]

Lessons/insights 

Apply and obey [How does today’s text apply to me? How will I obey or respond to the truths from today’s text?]

Prayer