1 Corinthians 5

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

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 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.