The Epistles to the Corinthians

Corinth was one of the great cities of the Greek world, a rich and cosmopolitan port, a crossroads of goods, of cults, and of loose morals. Razed by Rome in 146 before Christ, then rebuilt by Caesar as a Roman colony a century later, Corinth had filled again with freedmen in search of fortune and rank: hence the hunger for success and prestige that fed the rivalries and boasting Paul would have to correct. Its reputation for immorality was such that “to corinthianize” meant to live in debauchery; the city commanded two harbours and bore on its acropolis the temple of Aphrodite. This backdrop shows why Paul returns at such length to the holiness of the body, to meat offered to idols, and to the pride of the wise. Paul founded a Church there during his second journey and stayed nearly two years. The community was alive and filled with gifts, but crossed by disorders: rival parties, scandals, lawsuits between brothers, questions about marriage, about meat offered to idols, about the conduct of the assemblies, about the gifts of the Spirit, and about the resurrection. To the Corinthians Paul left two letters, in which he takes up and sets right all this in the light of Christ. These two letters are the only ones preserved, but they belong to a fuller exchange: Paul refers to an earlier letter now lost, “I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with the immoral.” 1 Corinthians 5:9 Between the two epistles he will also send a severe letter written in tears. The two texts we read are the peaks of a sustained correspondence.

A divided Church

The first evil Paul faces is division. The Corinthians claimed to belong, some to Paul, others to Apollos, others to Peter, as if they followed rival masters; Apollos, an eloquent Jew of Alexandria versed in the Scriptures, drew by his talent those who claimed him. Paul notes a fourth slogan, more telling still: “I belong to Paul. And I to Apollos. And I to Cephas. And I to Christ.” 1 Corinthians 1:12 To claim Christ against the others was to make him a party badge: the name that should have united them all became a cry of division. Paul reminds them that they are one people, sanctified in Christ: “to the Church of God that is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be holy.” 1 Corinthians 1:2 And he presses them to unity: “let there be no divisions among you, but be united in the same mind and the same conviction.” 1 Corinthians 1:10 The whole first letter labours to bring this scattered Church back to its one foundation, Christ.

The first letter

Written from Ephesus about the middle of the fifties, the first epistle answers point by point the news and the questions come from Corinth. Paul treats the wisdom of the Cross against the pride of the wise, the holiness of the body against immorality, the order of the assemblies and of the Supper, the diversity of gifts united in one body, the charity that surpasses them all, and finally the resurrection of the dead, the summit of the whole letter. Each answer brings a concrete problem back to a principle of faith.

The second letter

The second epistle is more personal. After a painful visit and a severe letter, Paul opens his heart, defends his ministry before those who contested it, and calls to reconciliation. He shows that the strength of God is deployed in the weakness of the apostle, and that all rests on the work God accomplishes through Christ: “God, who has reconciled us to himself through Christ and has entrusted to us the ministry of reconciliation.” 2 Corinthians 5:18 He also organizes the collection for the poor of Jerusalem, a sign of the communion between the Churches.