1 Corinthians 6

1 Corinthians 6:1

When there is any matter of controversy betwixt you about your worldly goods, I hear that you implead one another (see note [b] Rom. iii.) before the heathen tribunals, and use not that method prescribed by Christ to Christians, Matt. xviii. 15. How dareth any Christian do thus?

1 Corinthians 6:2

You cannot but know that in the great final judgment of all the world, the saints of God shall bear God company in judging the wicked; and if Christians shall then by God be vouchsafed that honour, to have any thing to do in matters of so much higher importance, is there any reason they should be deemed unworthy to be intrusted with the judging of worldly differences, which are much inferior to those of adjudging of men’s eternal being?

[a] to judge] That the word κριτήρια signifies not matters, but places of judicature, appears by Hesychius, (κριτήριον, δικαστήριον,) and authors and glossaries generally; and so in the sacred style, Susan. 49, where we read, the place of judgment. So Judges v. 10, sit in judgment; and Dan. vii. 10, the judgment was set, that is, the court of judges. And James ii. 6, κριτήρια are distinctly and necessarily rendered judgment-seats. And so here the Arabic interpreter renders it by words which are thus in Latin, subsellia judicii ad mundum pertinentis, “seats of judgment belonging to the world.”

1 Corinthians 6:3

It is certain that God’s children, when crowned by him, shall pronounce sentence against the evil spirits; and shall they not be thought fit to decide a controversy about an ordinary trespass among men?

1 Corinthians 6:4

If therefore there fall out betwixt you any matters of controversy concerning the matters of common life, which are to be brought to judicatures, or will not otherwise be composed, and if ye do despise the governors of your churches (which, since these dissensions are come in, are quite out of esteem among you) so far that ye do not think fit to stand to their sentences or decisions, yet sure ye have all reason to refer it to the simplest and meanest Christians, or even to set them in the tribunal, rather than carry your controversy before the Gentile courts.

1 Corinthians 6:5

My mentioning the meanest and most despicable among you, is to make you ashamed of your unreasonableness in supposing (as by going to heathen courts ye must be interpreted to do) that there is no one Christian fit for this employment; that is, that there is not one man of them that hath understanding enough to arbitrate an ordinary business between fellow-Christians, whose inclinableness to peace is to be presumed of, and then that must needs work somewhat toward the pacification.

1 Corinthians 6:6

But one Christian impleads his fellow Christian, and that before Gentiles.

1 Corinthians 6:7

It is not so well that you go to law at all; it were the part of a more excellent magnanimous Christian spirit, to be content to lose somewhat that were his own, to bear some injuries, rather than to go to law upon every trespass.

[b] a fault] The word ἤττημα is used Rom. xi. 12, and is opposed to πλήρωμα, fulness, noting there the great paucity of the Jewish converts to Christianity. Accordingly, though it be here applied to another matter, yet in the same notion it is a going less, or an inferior degree, which in respect of that which is to be expected of the higher proficient in Christianity, is a defect or failing, a low pitch for any Christian, but not such as can absolutely and universally be counted a sin, as not being against any precept. Contending, or going to law, for light inconsiderable matters, is forbidden by Christ, Matt. v. 40, but not absolutely, all contending for the recovering or defending one’s own, when the matter is of weight or importance. Only they that have gotten a superiority and contempt of the world, they will go higher than that strict precept, and rather endure considerable losses than engage themselves in such disquiets of mind and turmoils as such contentions use to bring with them: and to this is to be applied that which here follows in this place, why do ye not rather suffer injury and defraudation? that is, it is more Christian and excellent to do so. And in this respect, or comparatively to this higher virtue, the going to law at all, though it be not a sin, ἀμάρτημα or παράπτωμα, yet it is ἤττημα, a diminution, a less degree of Christian perfection; and that is all that is meant in this place. As for the word ὅλως, although that be left out

1 Corinthians 6:8

But some of you are so far from this excellent Christian temper, that you are ready to injure others, even your fellow Christians, and, so ye may gain to yourselves, care not how ye deprive others.

1 Corinthians 6:9

This is absolutely inconsistent with the Christian’s duty or reward; never do you flatter yourselves with a belief of the contrary, nor permit the false teachers that are crept in among you to give you any hope of it; and as for matters of injustice, so for all your other Gnostic practices of uncleanness (see notes [a] [h] and [i] ch. v.) and unnatural lust.

1 Corinthians 6:10

Neither they that are guilty of them, nor of any other injustice, shall, without reformation, ever be capable of inheriting the crown which is by Christ promised to Christians.

1 Corinthians 6:11

And such sins as these were ordinary among you in time of your heathen state, but now you have given up your names to Christianity, which denounce judgment against all these: your baptism is a renouncing of them all; your sanctification by the Spirit directly contrary to it; your justification by what Christ hath suffered and done for you, (see note [b] Matt. vii.) utterly incompatible with such impurities and injustices, spoken of either in the last or this chapter.

1 Corinthians 6:12

And whereas your teachers, to allure you to sensual practices, tell you, first, that all meat is freely to be eaten, and so sooth you up in luxury, and then proceed and persuade you, that the use of venery is as necessary for your bodies, and so as lawful, as eating of meat is; I shall tell you, first, that supposing them lawful, yet it will befit a Christian to abstain from many things that are not utterly unlawful; and secondly, that if indifferent things begin to get a dominion over any, if men, upon conceit that meats are lawful, come to be enslaved to their bellies, (as of

1 Corinthians 6:13

It is true, that meats are by God and nature appointed for the use of men, and that the body of man here in this life hath absolute necessity of them: and yet, to take off our hearts from them, we may also consider that in the next life, which is a spiritual life, this eating and desiring of meat shall be taken away, and therefore even here we should keep the flesh in such a subordination to the spirit, that we may be able to deny ourselves even lawful pleasures sometimes, especially when any occasion makes it more expedient, ver. 12. But then for fornication, (whatsoever your former heathen principles or present false teachers, the Gnostics, teach you,) that is no such lawful or indifferent thing; your bodies are to be consecrated to God either in lawful wedlock or in chaste single life, and by being kept pure here, must be made capable of rising to everlasting life with Christ hereafter, ver. 14.

1 Corinthians 6:14

And then God, that raised up Christ’s pure sinless body out of the grave, and hath made it a spiritual body, shall also do the same for us, though we lie down in the grave also.

1 Corinthians 6:15

And this one consideration may have force on you. Your bodies expect to rise with Christ, as members with the head: ye must not then in any reason pollute a member of Christ, a devoted consecrated person, by such unclean embraces.

1 Corinthians 6:16

That which was said at the institution of marriage in paradise, that the man and the wife become one body, concludes, that the fornicator makes himself one body with a whore.

1 Corinthians 6:17

As on the other side, he that keeps close to Christ’s commandments, and so cleaves to him, Deut. x. 20, hath a spiritual union with him, minds the same things that he minds, and so is very far from these carnal base joys, in which all the Gnostics’ religion consists.

1 Corinthians 6:18

Be sure therefore that ye keep yourselves far removed from that sin. Most other sins are committed against God, or the neighbour; but sins of uncleanness are against one’s self, a defiling of his flesh, a polluting of that which by chastity and single

¹⁶ take away, καταργήσει. two, ol 86o. ²⁰ cleaveth, ver. 16. ¹⁷ But the, Τὸ δέ. ¹⁸ cleaveth, κολλώμενος.