NT2213 The Pauline Tradition: 1 & 2 Corinthians
 Mary E. Hinkle
Associate Professor of New Testament
Luther Seminary
Fall 2004

Week 7 | Oct 18-24

To Do List for Week 7

  1. Read this web page and 1 Cor 8-14 in at least one English translation.
  2. Complete the "Hunt for Christian Community" (print-friendly version here).
  3. Read "Babette's Feast and Shaming the Poor in Corinth," by Robert Jewett. (I will arrange for this to be on e-reserve and library desk reserve.)
  4. If you have not finished "Comparing Translations," do so by Oct. 29. It's in the Coursework section of MyLutherNet.
  5. Blog on the topic of Christian community. Respond to the Jewett article or questions of mine in this week's Hunt.

What's love got to do with it?

1 Corinthians 12-14

Couples who are planning a wedding know 1 Corinthians 13 as "the love chapter." Yet the biblical context of the observation that "Love is patient and kind," is not the often gauzy-and-mauve setting of contemporary weddings. Paul's excursus on love is in the middle of a letter written to a fractious and fractured congregation. A more fitting place to read 1 Cor. 13 would be a room with old carpet, fluorescent lights and a church council that cannot agree on who they are, where they are going, or how to get there. 

Status in Corinth

There is a lot we do not know about the church to which Paul writes 1 & 2 Corinthians, but from Paul's side of the conversation, we can make a few guesses about them. Chief among what we know is that rank and status mattered a great deal to them.

The Corinthians were dividing themselves up according to loyalty to particular leaders ("I belong to Paul, I belong to Apollos..." [ 1:12]). They were also dividing themselves up according to whether they possessed knowledge and so were strong or had a troubled conscience about seemingly insignificant things and so were weak (cf. the discussion of eating meat that had been part of sacrifices to idols in chapter 8).

Into the context of a group of people concerned with having the right credentials, the highest status, and greatest degree of knowledge, Paul writes 1 Cor. 12-14. In these chapters, he speaks about (1) unearned gifts of the Spirit (2) the necessity for diversity in the church, and (3) the mutual dependence of all members on one another. He also writes about (4) love as "the greatest," greater than both ecstatic experiences and knowledge, which the Corinthians value so highly.

This week, we will read 1 Cor. 12-14, asking the question, "What's love got to do with it?" We will look closely at Paul's argument in 1 Cor. 12-14, at the center of which is the chapter on love. 

Big Issues this Week

Here again is the list of issues we have been focusing on through the course. You can find more about them in the introduction of Hays’s 1 Corinthians commentary.

  1. Christology
  2. Apocalyptic Eschatology
  3. Embodied Existence
  4. The Primacy of Love
  5. The Transformation of Power and Status through the Cross

This week’s focus will be on Christology and The Primacy of Love.

Rounded Rectangular Callout: For connections between Paul's view of Christ and his view of the church as the body of Christ, see Hays, 213-16, Cousar, 142-44, & Meeks, 89-91.

Christology

The metaphor of a group as a body with many members was a standard piece of rhetoric in the ancient world. It was usually used by people in power in order to keep people without power "in their place." Our secondary source readings this week point out that Paul is using the metaphor of a group as one body with many members differently from the way it is being used by philosophers and politicians of his time. For Paul, the church is not just a body with many members; it is the body of Christ. As such, the marks of the cross are identifying marks on that body. Rank, status and privilege are all reconfigured by the believers' union with the crucified one.

The Primacy of Love

In 1 Corinthians, Richard Hays writes, "Reacting to the Corinthians' overemphasis on knowledge and wisdom, Paul affirms that love must rule over all other values and virtues (8:1-13; 12:31b-13:13; 16:14)" (10). Paul is often thought of as an ideologue for whom right knowledge (or right theology or doctrine) was of supreme importance. Yet, the Corinthian letters do not bear out this conclusion. In his dealing with the Corinthians, Paul returns again and again to the theme that their knowledge and spiritual experience are as nothing if they do not have love for their brothers and sisters in Christ. For a similar point made by a different New Testament author, see 1 John 3:11-20.