MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE

In his advice to the Corinthian Christians Paul undoubtedly reveals a slightly ascetic tendency which is one of the chief bases of medieval monasticism and similar modern movements. He frankly states, however, that it is not on the authority of Jesus, but simply to insure the freedom of the individual Christians in the Corinthian church and to 'secure decorum and concentration upon a life of devotion to the Lord" (725, 35). He also says that the chief reason why he counselled those who are able to remain unmarried is the distress that he deems imminent and because he believes the interval until Christ comes again is short. At the same time he does not forbid marriage nor say that it is in any sense evil. In Ephesians 521-23 we have his true convictions regarding marriage expressed under more normal conditions. He there uses the figure of the marriage relation to describe Christ's intimate relation to the church. He reaffirms, as did Jesus (in Mark 109), its divine foundation as set forth in Genesis 224. Far from condemning it, he simply endeavors to make its bonds so strong that nothing can sever them. He exhorts all wives to reverence and be subject to their husbands. Even though Paul lacks Jesus' supremely chivalrous attitude toward woman, he does assert in Galatians 328: "There is no room for slave or freeman, there is no room for male and female; you are all one in Christ Jesus." To his exhortation to wives in Ephesians 5 (which reflects his oriental conception of woman) he adds the ringing command to husbands: "Let every man of you love his wife as himself." In I Corinthians 73, 4 he also places the intimate obligations of the husband to his wife and of the wife to her husband on an absolute equality. Here again we recognize the direct reflection of Jesus' absolute democracy and knightly chivalry which have exalted woman to her rightful place.

III. Paul's Practical Application of Jesus' Law of Love. The detailed problems of the tempted and perplexed Corinthian Christians precipitated some of Paul's noblest and most practical teachings. One of these questions was: "Shall we eat food that has been offered to heathen idols?" It is evident that much of the food, and especially the meat thus offered, was later exposed for sale in the public markets of Corinth. Hence it was almost impossible for the Christians to be sure that any food which they might buy had not been thus polluted. This insistent question had evidently developed two parties in the Corinthian church. One echoed Paul's teachings and asserted: "We all possess knowledge; belief is the essential thing. Mere ceremonial questions are entirely unimportant. As long as our

faith is clear and true, it makes no difference what we eat.” The other party-possibly the Cephas party-had not yet broken away from their traditional regard for ceremonial distinctions. Obviously the more broad-minded Corinthian Christians found great difficulty in satisfying the demands of these two antithetic positions. Paul meets the situation in his characteristic practical way. "Yes," he declared, "knowledge is all right but it puffs up. There is a higher principle and that is love, for it builds up." Here again he used a word which appealed with peculiar power to the Greek mind. To build was their dominant ambition and genius. Knowledge, Paul declares, is individualistic but love is social and constructive. Thus early in his epistle he strikes that lofty note which forever immortalizes it. His application of the principle of love is as clear as it is convincing. It is the guide of individual liberty. Liberty and knowledge thus guided by love will never permit a brother to ride roughshod over the conscientious scruples of a fellow Christian. In eating food offered to idols, therefore, each man will be governed not only by his own conception of what is right but by the effect of his act upon his less enlightened brothers. Back of Paul's teachings lay his own life and example, which he repeatedly cites with great effectiveness. Forgetting his own individualistic point of view and selfish wishes, he had become all things to all men to win them to Christ. Again adopting a figure very dear to the inhabitants of a city long famous for its Isthmian games, he urges the Corinthian Christians to keep this high goal ever in view and, like trained athletes, make everything else subservient to attaining it. At the conclusion of this discussion stands Paul's great social confession of faith: "Thus I seek to satisfy all men in all points, aiming not at my own advantage but at that of the many that they may be saved." In this practical way Paul interpreted by example, as well as by word, Jesus' supreme command: "Do to others as you would have them do to you.'

IV. "The Body of Christ." In setting forth his social teachings, Paul employed a figure already used by the Stoic philosophers. They, however, spoke of all humanity as one body. Paul had in mind, when he used this pregnant phrase "the Body of Christ," the collective group of Christian believers. It was the objective social realization of Jesus' ideal of the Kingdom of God. It recognized that in this more ideal social group each had his own peculiar gift and task. If one member suffers, all the members share his suffering. As each contributes faithfully to the rest, the whole body prospers. The

THE BODY OF CHRIST

fidelity of each individual member is, therefore, essential to the welfare of the whole. Hence each individual gift must be consecrated to the common social good. It was from this higher vantage-point that Paul approached the problems presented by the jealousy between the different members of the Corinthian church and the heartburns caused by the fact that some appeared to possess higher spiritual gifts than others. It is evident from his statements that the intellectual and emotional life of that church was intense. Paul recognized the danger that it might become merely individualistic, merely emotional, and therefore shallow. The picture which he gives of its life is exceedingly illuminating. In his recapitulation he places first the more intellectual gifts: the power to speak words of wisdom and knowledge by the Spirit; second, the gift of faith and the corresponding power of healing; third, the more intuitive gift of prophecy, which is evidently here used in the sense of preaching and exhorting; and, fourth, the unconscious gift of tongues or ecstatic utterance and the power of interpreting the meaning of these emotional ejaculations. Each, Paul declares, is inspired by the same divine Spirit. Each is of value simply as it is made to conserve the common good. The one supreme aim must be the edification, that is, the building up of the Christian body.

V. Paul's Immortal Hymn in Praise of Love. It was while Paul was struggling to emphasize the importance of the motive that should lie back of these various expressions of the religious life that there dawned upon him the immortal principle which is crystallized in his matchless hymn in praise of love. It is one of his wonderful digressions, and yet it was the culmination of all of his thinking in the early part of the epistle and the embodiment of his own life and experience. He calls it the still higher way in which these spiritual gifts are to be used. With a remarkable breadth and insight he declares that all those gifts that were so highly esteemed in the early church, and even the most passionate self-sacrificing devotion, were absolutely useless unless inspired and guided by brotherly love. Then follows the familiar description of the characteristics of love's way in I Corinthians 1347. Its background is the personal ambitions, the jealousy, the self-glorification, the backbiting, the factiousness, and the discouragement of the Corinthian Christians. Clearly Paul sees the intellectual and moral perils that confront them. Only as they are lifted into the higher levels of faith and feeling can they hope to realize the ideals which he set before them. Childish, indeed, seemed their bickerings. Like a father, he yearned to lead them on from imper

Paul at

sus

(Acts 1819-23)

Apollos at Ephe

sus and Achaia (24-28)

Dis

ciples

at

Ephe

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fection to perfection, to teach them step by step until they might attain a perfect vision of truth. In meeting all these universal needs, he declared that not human knowledge but faith and hope and love were eternal and invincible; yet the greatest of all was love.

8 CLIX. PAUL'S MINISTRY AT EPHESUS

When Priscilla and Aquila reached Ephesus, Paul left them there, but he went into the synagogue and argued with the Jews, who asked him to stay for a longer time, but he would not consent. Instead, taking leave of them, he said, I will come back to you, if it be the will of God. Then sailing from Ephesus and reaching Cæsarea, he went up to salute the church and then travelled down to Antioch. After spending some time there he went off on a journey through the Galatian and Phrygian region, strengthening all the disciples.

Meanwhile a Jew by the name of Apollos came to EpheHe was a native of Alexandria, a man of culture, strong in his knowledge of the scriptures. He had been instructed in the way of the Lord, and he preached zealously and taught accurately about Jesus, though all the baptism he knew was that of John. He began to speak boldly in the synagogue; but after Priscilla and Aquila listened to him they took him home and explained more accurately to him the way of God. And as he wished to cross over to Achaia, the brothers wrote urging the disciples there to welcome him. And on his arrival he rendered great service to those who by God's grace had believed, for he powerfully and publicly refuted the Jews, showing from the scripture that Jesus was the Messiah.

It was while Apollos was in Corinth that Paul, after passof John ing through the inland districts, came to Ephesus and found there certain disciples to whom he said, Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? No, they replied, we (191-7) have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit. Then he said, In what were you baptized? They replied, In John's baptism. John, said Paul, baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling the people that they should believe him who was to come after him, that is in Jesus. When they heard this, they had themselves baptized in the name

DISCIPLES OF JOHN AT EPHESUS

of the Lord Jesus. And after Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they began speaking with tongues and prophesying. They were in all about twelve men.

of

at

Then Paul entered the synagogue and for three months Paul's spoke fearlessly, arguing and persuading people about the method Kingdom of God. But as some grew stubborn and dis- work obedient, defaming the way in the presence of the multi- Ephetude, he left them, withdrew the disciples, and continued sus his argument every day from eleven to four in the lecture room of Tyrannus. This continued for two years, so that all the inhabitants of the province of Asia, both Jews and Greeks, heard the word of the Lord.

(8-10)

acles

by

God also worked no ordinary miracles by means of Paul, Mirso that even towels or aprons which he had used were percarried to the sick and they were delivered from their dis- formed eases and evil spirits came out of them. Certain travelling Paul Jewish exorcists also attempted to pronounce the name of (11-20) the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches. The seven sons of a certain Sceva, a Jewish high priest, were doing this; but the evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know and Paul I know, but who are you? And the man in whom was the evil spirit, springing at them, overpowered two of them and treated them with such violence that they rushed out of the house stripped and wounded. This became known to all the inhabitants of Ephesus, Jews as well as Greeks; and awe fell on them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. Many believers also came to confess and declare what they had done. And numbers who practised magic arts collected their books and burned them in the presence of Paul. When they added up their value they found that they were worth about ten thousand dollars. Thus the word of the Lord mightily increased and prevailed.

plans

(21, 22)

After these events had transpired Paul resolved in the Paul's spirit to travel through Macedonia and Achaia to Jerusalem, saying, After I get there I must see Rome. So he sent two of his assistants to Macedonia, Timothy and Erastus, while he himself stayed on for a while in Asia.