1 Corinthians chapter 7

Long chapter!

vs 1

This verse can literally mean two things. Literally, it says "Now about things of which you wrote, it is good for a man not to touch a woman". Seems easy, right? But the greek for "man" also means "husband", and the greek for "woman" also means wife. And the greek for "touch" can also mean "to adhere to" and was used to mean "marry" as well as "sex up".

It makes sense really - in greek society, and hell, in most societies back then, marriage wasn't nice, it was mandatory. You grew up, got married, and that was that. So "man" and "husband" were interchangeable.

So what was the situation in this verse? It is to do with the context of what the Corinthians wrote to Paul. Is this a quote from their letter? Did they say that this is good? There is a persuasive argument for this - after all, to just say "Now regarding what you wrote about - " without first outlining what they wrote about would seem odd.

But, he could be doing that, in which case the statement about remaining unmarried is his own. It's hard to say.

vs 2

But now Paul does speak, and he says that there is lots of immorality going on (and we assume at Corinth). And because of this, marriage is suggested.

vs 3

What says "marital duty" in english says "pay your debt" in greek. So really, husbands are indebted to their wives, and vice versa. You owe something to your other half.

vs 4

The NIV is quite nice in its translation of this, but the NASB is more correct. There is no suggestion in the greek that the wife or husband has any claim to their own body. It is a complete giving up of ownership of what is yours, and a receipt of what is not. One of the most damaging things in a marriage relationship is not letting your body be the property of your spouse. And this is not just about sex. It's about comfort, it's about showing love, and togetherness. Remember, a lot of people's primary love language is physical touch, and I doubt that for many it is the bottom 2 unless they have had some sort of bad experience as a child or something. Physical touch is a powerful thing - I don't remember who said it, but they said "If you don't believe me, just stroke the hair of the person sitting in front of you on the bus".

vs 5

Ok, so this is focussing more on sex methinks. Now, why you deny each other for prayer, I'm not actually sure. I think it's got to do with the fact that prayer was so much a bigger part of life back then, and we really have no idea. It is quite possible that this idea is like the idea of fasting, but with sex. Muslims still sex-fast during Ramadan. But Paul says don't do it too much, or else you might get tempted to break your sex fast somewhere with someone you shouldn't.

vs 6

I don't think Paul is saying the sex-fast thing as a concession - I think more the whole thing about marrying is a concession, considering what he says next. But this poses an interesting question - if Paul is saying this is not a command, do we need to follow it? Does it's status as "inspired" mean that even if Paul didn't mean for it to be a command, it is still a command for us?

Personally, I don't think so. I think that if it were meant as a concession to the Corinthian church, then it is meant as a concession for people in the same position. It is principles that apply, not dogmatic legalistic rules. And the principle here is not that everyone must marry, but that marrying, while being a concession to people because of the lack of purity, is the solution to the problem.

vs 7

Now, what was Paul exactly? It's pretty much impossible to believe that he was single. He never says that he was a member of any orders which denied marriage to their members (although there were a couple of Pharisaical groups that did, my understanding is that Paul was not a member of those groups), the Nazerites might have (not sure on that, but again Paul wasn't one... although Jesus might have been depending on who you ask - but again, you'd think someone would have mentioned it).

Most people think that Paul was a widower. There was a lot of pressure on people to marry, but not nearly as much on widows or widowers to remarry. In fact, Many people found that, once their spouse died, they had a freedom that they'd always wanted, especially women (of course, you had to be wealthy to do this - poor widows were just pitied).

Now I don't think Paul is saying "I hope all your spouses die". Instead, he is saying that each person is given gifts from God in different ways. Now the greek word charisma does usually connote some sort of divine gift of extraordinary power, but it doesn't always mean that. It can just mean a gift from God, like not having a wife. And I think that is how it must be read, because in context Paul isn't talking about spiritual gifts at all.

vs 8

Someone made a really excellent point to me about this passage a little while ago. They said "Ben, if it's true that the society in which the Corinthians lived expected people to marry, then it is understandable who the widows are, but who are "the unmarried"? Now you instantly want to answer "young single people", and I think people have said that for ages. But the simple fact is that as a group, they don't really exist. This person then went on to tell me about their experiences on the mission field, where they lived in a culture similar to the ancient one. He said unmarried people don't exist - they are called children (and even then they are spoken for usually). Widows exist, and their lives suck. But the "unmarried", in the culture he was in, were the worst off of all - they were the divorced. You see, we seem to think that because God said "don't divorce" that divorce doesn't happen. But this is a greek society, not a hebrew one. And that's a stupid distinction anyway, because plenty of Jews divorced their wives! Jesus speaks against it! The fact is that divorce happened back then, and those who were the divorced especially the women, were in a bad situation. The men were better off, but not heaps, because who wants to give you their daughter if you're only going to soil her then divorce her like you did your last one? It gets very expensive (in bride prices and the like).

Paul's message to these people is "stay unmarried".

vs 9

But, if you're going to get yourself into trouble, then you should marry. Simple, but effective.

vs 10

Now, here is a perfect example of the whole divorce thing - Paul is giving a command, and is careful to show that it is from God. And that command is not to separate from your spouse. This verse only says wife, but the next verse says husband too, so it does go both ways.

vs 11

Paul then says that if it does happen, then here's what to do! You know why? Because Paul knows that even though God says "don't divorce", people, Christians, will do it anyway! That's just a fact. But he then goes on to say that if you do divorce your wife or husband, then stay single, or get back with your spouse. Of course, plenty of Christians don't do this either - to be expected, because they ignored the first command anyway.

vs 12-13

Now we get to another of these cases where Paul is making concessions, not commands. This time though, he wants to go out of his way to say that these are his own thoughts, and did not come from the Lord (and they didn't - show me where Jesus says anything about this).

Paul's idea, then, is that you must not divorce a non-Christian person who is prepared to stay with you. So if you become a Christian, and you're already married to someone, and they don't mind staying married, then stay married. Again, it is the same for men and women.

vs 14

Now this verse, this is just a whole bunch of crazy. I tihnk we tend to ignore or minimise the idea of communal or familial salvation because we live in an individualistic culture. And so it's hard to say what Paul really means here without having a good understanding of that communal culture. But not only that, Paul is talking about holiness and uncleanness as a status that can be granted through relation. I mean, we spend all our time telling young church kids that they can't piggy-back off their parent's faith, and that they have to make it their own. But really that's only because we live in a society where children are allowed (and often encouraged) to believe things different to what their parents believe. It's a price of progress some would say.

To me, this verse represents the power of God's holiness. It is not squashed by only one parent being holy - instead, it is so powerful that it covers up the unholiness of one parent. And the kids don't come out unclean, as if it were the dominant gene. No, holiness is the dominant gene, and so the kids come out not half-holy, but wholly holy. That's what I think anyway.