2 Corinthians 11:20

For ye suffer if a man bring you into bondage,.... They not only suffered and tolerated the foolish boasting of these men with pleasure, but patiently and stupidly bore their oppressions, injuries,

For ye suffer, if a man bring you into bondage, if a man devour you, if a man take of you, if a man exalt himself, if a man smite you on the face. For - ye may well "bear with" fools; for ye even "bear with" oppressors.

If any domineer over you, as if you were their slaves, or if any bring you into subjection to the rites of the ceremonial law; if they devour and make a prey of you, take wages of you, and do nothing without hire; if they carry themselves proudly, exalting themselves above you; nay, if they smite you, you will suffer and bear with such: this is more than to bear with a little folly and indiscretion in me. This is observable, that men of corrupt hearts and loose lives will better bear with teachers that will humour and spare them in their lusts, than with such as are faithful to their souls in instructing and reproving them, though they carry themselves with the greatest innocency and justice towards them.

20 For ye suffer, if a man bring you into bondage, if a man devour you, if a man take of you, if a man exalt himself, if a man smite you on the face. Ver. 20. For ye suffer, if, &c.] As the Popish penitentiaries, those miserably misled and muzzled creatures. They write of our King Henry II, that going to Canterbury to visit the sepulchre of his own martyr, Thomas Beckett, coming within sight of the church, he alighted, and went three miles on his bare feet, which with the hard stones were forced to yield bloody tokens of his devotion on the way. (Daniel’ s Hist.) Clemens V, pope, caused Dandalus, the Venetian ambassador, to come before him tied in chains, and to wallow under his table with dogs, while his Holiness sat at supper. The pope lashed Henry IV of France (in the person of his ambassador at Rome) after the singing of every verse of Miserere , until the whole Psalm was sung out. Sed exorto iam evangelii iubare, sagaciores (at spero) principes ad nutum Romani Orbilii non solvent subligacula, saith a great divine. (Gab. Powell on Tolerat.) If a man take of you] By way of gratuity, but not of wages; or by their followers, and not by themselves. No Capuchin among the Papists may take or touch silver. This metal is as very anathema to these, as the wedge of gold to Achan; at the offer whereof he starts back, as Moses from the serpent. Yet he carries a boy with him that takes and carries it, and never complains of either metal or measure. A friar of the order of St. Francis, of the new rule of 1528. So called from the sharp-pointed capuche, adopted first in 1525, and confirmed to them by Pope Clement VII in 1528. ŒD

(20) For ye suffer, if a man bring you into bondage.—Every word in the sentence clearly points to something that Titus had told him of the action of these rival teachers. They reproduced, in their worst form, the vices of the Pharisaism of Palestine (Matthew 23:4; Matthew 23:14; Matthew 23:25). They enslaved the consciences of men (the same word is used of the same class of men in Galatians 2:4) by pressing on them an iron code of rules which left no room for the free play of conscience and of reason in those over whom they claimed to act as directors. If a man devour you.—The word again reminds us of our Lord’s denunciation of the teachers who “devoured widows’ houses” (Matthew 23:14). If a man take of you . . .—The words in italics are wrongly supplied, and turn this clause into a feeble repetition of the preceding. Better, if a man takes you in. In 2 Corinthians 12:16, we have the same construction (“I caught you with guile”) obviously with this sense. If a man smite you on the face.—This last form of outrage was, as St. Paul was soon to experience (Acts 23:2), not unfamiliar to Jewish priests and scribes, as the most effective way of silencing an opponent. We have an earlier instance of its application in the action of Zedekiah, the son of Chenaanah (1 Kings 22:24). That it had found its way into the Christian Church in the apostolic time is seen in St. Paul’s rule that a bishop should be no “striker” (1 Timothy 3:3; Titus 1:7). It is obvious that he had heard of an instance in which this had actually been done at Corinth, and he taunts them with the tameness of their submission. Did he forget, or had he not as yet heard the law of Mat 5:39; or was he, knowing it, for a time unmindful of it, in this rush of emotion which he himself feels to be simply human, and therefore not inspired?

Verse 20. For ye suffer] As you are so meek and gentle as to submit to be brought into bondage, to have your property devoured, your goods taken away, yourselves laid in the dust, so that others may exalt themselves over you, yea, and will bear from those the most degrading indignity; then of course, you will bear with one who has never insulted, defrauded, devoured, taken of you, exalted himself against you, or offered you any kind of indignity; and who only wishes you to bear his confident boasting, concerning matters which he can substantiate. The expressions in this verse are some evidence that the false apostle was a Judaizing teacher. You suffer, says the apostle, if a man, καταδουλοι, bring you into bondage, probably meaning to the Jewish rites and ceremonies, Galatians 4:9; Galatians 5:1. If he devour you; as the Pharisees did the patrimony of the widows, and for a pretence made long prayers; if a man take of you, exact different contributions, pretendedly for the temple at Jerusalem, c. If he exalt himself, pretending to be of the seed of Abraham, infinitely higher in honour and dignity than all the families of the Gentiles if he smite you on the face-treat you with indignity, as the Jews did the Gentiles, considering them only as dogs, and not fit to be ranked with any of the descendants of Jacob.

20. For ye suffer] (susteynen, Wiclif). “This may be understood in three ways. (1) He may be understood as reproving the Corinthians ironically, because of their inability to bear with anything, or (2) as charging them with sluggishness of spirit, because they had shamefully enslaved themselves to the false Apostles, or (3) he repeats in the person of another what was maliciously affirmed regarding himself, namely, that he claimed a tyrannical authority over them.” Calvin. If, with him and many ancient commentators, we adopt (2), the sense is, as Calvin goes on to say, ‘You bear with all kinds of indignities from others, why not with far less from me, who am in every respect their equal, if not their superior, in the very qualifications by which you set so much store?’ This interpretation agrees best with the context (see next verse). The connection of this verse with the former will then be as follows: ‘You pride yourselves on being sensible people, and certainly you have immense toleration for folly. You even endure the foolish—or worse than foolish—insults of men who have no claim whatever to lord it over you. Why then not bear with me, when I condescend for a moment to the level of their folly? You will crouch to worthless pretenders, why resist the voice of real authority?’if a man bring you into bondage] Literally, enslave you. Our translation is Tyndale’s. Cf. Galatians 2:4; Galatians 4:9; Galatians 5:1.devour you] Cf. Matthew 23:14; and the LXX. of Isaiah 9:12. These false teachers were animated by none of St Paul’s delicacy as regards money matters. It could not be said of them that they were no Apostles, because they had no claim to be maintained by the Churches.take of you] Rather, seize you, i.e. as a hunter his victim, or a man his property (cf. ch. 2 Corinthians 12:16). The earlier versions rendered simply by take, as though doubtful of the meaning. It was the Geneva that first added ‘your goods.smite you on the face] An utterly extraordinary and inconceivable piece of presumption, according to our modern notions. But we do not habitually realize the immense extent to which Christianity has leavened our habits. Dean Stanley refers us to 1 Kings 22:24; Matthew 5:39; Luke 22:64; Acts 23:2; 1 Timothy 3:3; Titus 1:7; and to the canon of the Council of Braga (a.d. 675), which orders that no bishop at his will and pleasure shall strike (the original, however, seems to imply scourging) his clergy, lest he lose the respect which they owe him. He might have referred also to the famous Latrocinium, or Robber-Synod of Ephesus, in which one patriarch of the Church and his adherents literally stamped another to death, and even to a period so late as the Council of Trent, in which it is admitted, even by the Jesuit historian Pallavicino, that scenes of personal violence occurred among those who were or should have been teachers of religion. See his History of the Council of Trent, Book viii. ch. 6.

For ye suffer ... - You bear patiently with people who impose on you in every way, and who are constantly defrauding you, though you profess to be so wise, and you may bear with me a little, though I have no such intention.

20. For ye suffer—Paul now describes, in somewhat figurative terms, the treatment these Corinthians, in their fancied wisdom, tamely accepted from the Christine false apostles. Bondage—To this authority and these false doctrines.