1-2 Corinthians: Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture
Reviewed by Robert P. Mills, September 14, 1999
Written only a quarter-century after Jesus’ resurrection, Paul’s letters to the church at Corinth were sent to Christians facing a variety of problems, many of which “focused around the vexing questions of authority and leadership.”
Sound familiar?
It is hard to think of material more immediately relevant to the modern church than First and Second Corinthians. Consider some of the issues Paul addressed in these letters: the reality of the resurrection; showing generosity toward those in need; the role of spiritual gifts, including speaking in tongues; sexual immorality.
Heresy and immorality
In the church today there is a tendency to segregate such concerns into isolated enclaves: the resurrection falls into the domain of the theologians, charity is assigned to the social justice folks, spiritual gifts are the special province of the charismatics and issues of sexual immorality, well, that’s either someone else’s department or no one else’s business.
Such theological cleansing, however, is a recent phenomenon. Such early church pastor-scholars as Athanasius and Augustine, Clement of Rome and Gregory of Nyssa, Iranaeus and Chrysostom, were unembarrassed by the fact that right belief is inseparable from right behavior. Particularly in their sermons and commentaries on First and Second Corinthians, “The close link in the patristic mind between doctrinal heresy and immorality comes across clearly,” writes Gerald Bray, professor of Anglican studies at Beeson Divinity School.
Bray continues, “Uncertainties about leadership at Corinth had produced a situation in which the church was in danger of dissolving into competing factions based on personalities, some of whom were teaching false doctrine as well. From the experiences of their time, the Fathers were aware that unity and truth went together, and they constantly emphasized this link in their commentaries on these epistles.”
Prepared for a lay audience
1-2 Corinthians is the fourth of Intervarsity Press’ Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture. As with the other commentaries in this series, the biblical texts are divided into short passages, which are printed at the head of each section. Next comes an editor’s overview, which outlines the main themes of the various comments. The comments themselves follow under thematic subheads, an approach that helps readers follow the main threads of Paul’s arguments while allowing exploration of the details of the text. A chronology of persons and writings, biographical sketches of the commentators and author, and subject and scripture indices are valuable additions to the commentary.
In the words of General Editor Thomas Oden, this series “has been intentionally prepared for a general lay audience of nonprofessionals who study the Bible regularly and who earnestly wish to have classic Christian observation on the text readily available to them. The series is targeted to anyone who wants to reflect and meditate with the early church about the plain sense, theological wisdom and moral meaning of particular Scripture texts.”
Oden further notes that there is “an emerging awareness among Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox laity that vital biblical preaching and spiritual formation need deeper grounding beyond the scope of the historical-critical orientations that have governed biblical studies in our day.”
As the modern church attempts to meet this need while addressing “the vexing questions of authority and leadership,” this volume is a welcome reminder that the great Scripture scholars of the first eight Christian centuries still have much to teach us.