The Call For Unity In 1 Corinthians 1: 10– 17
“I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment. For it has been reported to me by Chloe's people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers. What I mean is that each one of you says, "I follow Paul," or "I follow Apollos," or "I follow Cephas," or "I follow Christ." Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, so that no one may say that you were baptized in my name. (I did baptize also the household of Stephanas. Beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized anyone else.) For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.”
Historical Context
The city of Corinth in the first century A.D. was an affluent Roman colony situated strategically close to the western port of Lechaeum and eastern harbor of Cenchreae. The older Corinth had been sacked and destroyed by Lucius Mummius for defying Rome in 146 B.C. However, Julius Caesar reestablished it as a colony shortly before his assassination. When Paul arrived at Corinth around 51 A.D., it had a mixed population of Roman freedmen, indigenous Greeks, sailors, merchants and Jewish immigrants. Being a relatively young mercantile colony of freedmen, its culture was not tradition-bound and spurred ambitions to seek material success and public status. According to David Garland, such aspirations would be greatly served by “attaining the patronage of powerful persons… exerting political enmity to ostracize opponents, and employing skillful oratory to persuade others in any assembly.” There were probably itinerant Sophists whose rhetorical and philosophical skills could be hired to give convincing speeches on behalf of their employers.
Being a cosmopolitan melting pot, it was not surprising to read the Greek writer Pausanius describing about 26 temples and shrines dedicated to various pagan gods. Emperor cults, mystery religions and fertility cults for deities like Apollo, Aphrodite, Osiris, Mithras and others were rampant. Even though Strabo's record of 1,000 sacred prostitutes in the temple on the Acrocorinth may be an exaggeration, sexual immorality in the city was probably similar to other commercial centers at that time. It is at this place that Paul established a community of faith that inherited the corporate vocation of God’s covenant people, Israel.
Exegesis
Paul’s epistle to the Corinthians was partly a response prompted by reports of divisions he gathered from Chloe’s people. After greeting the church in a customary salutation and thanksgiving, in which he reaffirmed the troubled church as having been “enriched in every way – in all your speaking and in all your knowledge” (verse 5), he proceeded to address the first problem of internal dissensions in the church. He appealed the Corinthian community of faith to be “united in mind and thought” in the name of Christ (verse 10). The theme of unity within the community would occupy much of Paul’s thoughts in the first four chapters of 1 Corinthians.
Regarding the call for unity, it should not be confused as a reference to dull, monolithic unison. Lightfoot (1895) writes: “We have here a strictly classical expression. It is used of political communities which are free from factions, or of different states which entertain friendly relations with each other”.
What has caused the quarrels amongst the believers in Corinth? In the prevailing Greco-Roman culture, it was known that religious teachers were exalted to the status of “theanthropoid”, men possessing divine qualities . It is possible that the relatively new converts carry over this tendency to elevate their Christian teachers on a pedestal and pit them against each other. Other mitigating sociological factors have been suggested by Gerd Theissen’s research on social tensions between the rich and poor in the congregation and Jerome Murphy O’Connor’s on how distinctive ethos may develop because the villa architecture used for such church gatherings allow for preferred guests and less privileged members to be compartmentalized.
Much discussion amongst scholars revolve around the nature of division in Corinth based on the four slogan-like catchphrases - “I belong to Paul”, “I belong to Apollos”, “I belong to Cephas” and “I belong to Christ”. FC Baur argued that a theological controversy not unlike the heated debate in Galatians 2:11-15 was to be blamed. He associated the Paul group as people with “radical emancipation from the law” struggling against the Judaizing parties represented by the Cephas group. On a similar vein, Robertson and Plummer saw four possible theological factions. The Apollos group represented “Hellenistic intellectualism”, the Cephas group championed “conciliatory conservatism” and the “Christ” group was comprised of “zealots for the law, hostile to the apostleship of St.Paul”.
“I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment. For it has been reported to me by Chloe's people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers. What I mean is that each one of you says, "I follow Paul," or "I follow Apollos," or "I follow Cephas," or "I follow Christ." Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, so that no one may say that you were baptized in my name. (I did baptize also the household of Stephanas. Beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized anyone else.) For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.”
Historical Context
The city of Corinth in the first century A.D. was an affluent Roman colony situated strategically close to the western port of Lechaeum and eastern harbor of Cenchreae. The older Corinth had been sacked and destroyed by Lucius Mummius for defying Rome in 146 B.C. However, Julius Caesar reestablished it as a colony shortly before his assassination. When Paul arrived at Corinth around 51 A.D., it had a mixed population of Roman freedmen, indigenous Greeks, sailors, merchants and Jewish immigrants. Being a relatively young mercantile colony of freedmen, its culture was not tradition-bound and spurred ambitions to seek material success and public status. According to David Garland, such aspirations would be greatly served by “attaining the patronage of powerful persons… exerting political enmity to ostracize opponents, and employing skillful oratory to persuade others in any assembly.” There were probably itinerant Sophists whose rhetorical and philosophical skills could be hired to give convincing speeches on behalf of their employers. Being a cosmopolitan melting pot, it was not surprising to read the Greek writer Pausanius describing about 26 temples and shrines dedicated to various pagan gods. Emperor cults, mystery religions and fertility cults for deities like Apollo, Aphrodite, Osiris, Mithras and others were rampant. Even though Strabo's record of 1,000 sacred prostitutes in the temple on the Acrocorinth may be an exaggeration, sexual immorality in the city was probably similar to other commercial centers at that time. It is at this place that Paul established a community of faith that inherited the corporate vocation of God’s covenant people, Israel.
Exegesis
Paul’s epistle to the Corinthians was partly a response prompted by reports of divisions he gathered from Chloe’s people. After greeting the church in a customary salutation and thanksgiving, in which he reaffirmed the troubled church as having been “enriched in every way – in all your speaking and in all your knowledge” (verse 5), he proceeded to address the first problem of internal dissensions in the church. He appealed the Corinthian community of faith to be “united in mind and thought” in the name of Christ (verse 10). The theme of unity within the community would occupy much of Paul’s thoughts in the first four chapters of 1 Corinthians.
Regarding the call for unity, it should not be confused as a reference to dull, monolithic unison. Lightfoot (1895) writes: “We have here a strictly classical expression. It is used of political communities which are free from factions, or of different states which entertain friendly relations with each other”.
What has caused the quarrels amongst the believers in Corinth? In the prevailing Greco-Roman culture, it was known that religious teachers were exalted to the status of “theanthropoid”, men possessing divine qualities . It is possible that the relatively new converts carry over this tendency to elevate their Christian teachers on a pedestal and pit them against each other. Other mitigating sociological factors have been suggested by Gerd Theissen’s research on social tensions between the rich and poor in the congregation and Jerome Murphy O’Connor’s on how distinctive ethos may develop because the villa architecture used for such church gatherings allow for preferred guests and less privileged members to be compartmentalized.
Much discussion amongst scholars revolve around the nature of division in Corinth based on the four slogan-like catchphrases - “I belong to Paul”, “I belong to Apollos”, “I belong to Cephas” and “I belong to Christ”. FC Baur argued that a theological controversy not unlike the heated debate in Galatians 2:11-15 was to be blamed. He associated the Paul group as people with “radical emancipation from the law” struggling against the Judaizing parties represented by the Cephas group. On a similar vein, Robertson and Plummer saw four possible theological factions. The Apollos group represented “Hellenistic intellectualism”, the Cephas group championed “conciliatory conservatism” and the “Christ” group was comprised of “zealots for the law, hostile to the apostleship of St.Paul”.
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