The Second Epistle to the Corinthians

Paul Barnett

• Publisher: Eerdmans
• Year: 1997
• ISBN:
  9781467422635
• Topic: Teología y religión
• Subtopic: Estudios bíblicos

This statement reflects the underlying purpose of The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Begun in the late 1940s by an international team of New Testament scholars, the NICNT series has become recognized by pastors, students, and scholars alike as a critical yet orthodox commentary marked by solid biblical scholarship within the evangelical Protestant tradition. While based on a thorough study of the Greek text, the commentary introductions and expositions contain a minimum of Greek references. The NICNT authors evaluate significant textual problems and take into account the most important exegetical literature. More technical aspects — such as grammatical, textual, and historical problems — are dealt with in footnotes, special notes, and appendixes. Under the general editorship of three outstanding New Testament scholars — first Ned Stonehouse (Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia), then F. F. Bruce (University of Manchester, England), and now Gordon D. Fee (Regent College, Vancouver, British Columbia) — the NICNT series has continued to develop over the years. In order to keep the commentary "new" and conversant with contemporary scholarship, the NICNT volumes have been — and will be — revised or replaced as necessary. The newer NICNT volumes in particular take into account the role of recent rhetorical and sociological inquiry in elucidating the meaning of the text, and they also exhibit concern for the theology and application of the text. As the NICNT series is ever brought up to date, it will continue to find ongoing usefulness as an established guide to the New Testament text.

Text, Exposition, and Notes

I. INTRODUCTION (1:1–11)

Paul commences his letter formally with a salutation (vv. 1–2) and a benediction (vv. 3–7). God’s deliverance of Paul in Asia (vv. 8–11) is a concrete example of his comfort of the apostle more generally stated in the benediction. The salutation and benediction are not merely formal, however, but are closely connected with and lead into the next section (1:12–2:13), where Paul defends his decision to write to them (the lost “Severe Letter”) instead of returning to them directly as, apparently, he had indicated during the recent “Painful Visit.”

From the outset Paul is attempting to restore the now-strained relationships with the Corinthians. As an apostle, “by the will of God” (v. 1), he has the duty to comfort the saints in their affliction with the comfort he has received from God (vv. 4–5). Having stated that general principle, he specifically declares that God’s comfort in his afflictions—including the extreme affliction in Asia (vv. 8–9)—is for the sake of the Corinthians (v. 6). Such is the intended spiritual unity between apostle and messianic people that, just as his comfort by God was for them, so, in response, their prayers are for him (v. 11).

This theme continues beyond the present section. He is their fellow worker for their joy, not the Lord of their faith (1:24). His expectation and concern is that the Corinthians will understand and take pride in him, as, indeed, he will take pride in them on the “day of Christ” (1:14). He reminds them that their experience of the Spirit of God resulted from his preaching of the Son of God among them (1:19, 22). He knows of the possibility that Satan will get the better of them, separating him from them (2:11). This mutuality between him and them depends in turn on a reestablished confidence in his integrity (1:12–14). The restoration of unity between him and them is a major theme not only in this opening section of the letter but throughout his exposition of his new covenant ministry (2:14–7:4) and the passionate final chapters of the letter (chaps. 10–13).

References to God—his character and actions—unify the Introduction, and indeed the first sections of this letter. God is the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ and “our” Father, from whom grace and peace come (vv. 1–2). Paul’s use of the present tense for God’s actions implies a number of divine attributes. (1) God is a comforter who comforts the afflicted (1:4). (2) God who raises the dead has delivered and will deliver his servant (1:9–10). God is to be blessed (1:3) and thanked for answered prayer (v. 11). (3) God, who is faithful, guarantees their ongoing Christward confidence, following the preaching of the Son of God and the beginning of the activity of the Spirit among them, confirming that they have turned to the Lord (1:18, 19, 22; cf. 3:16, 17).

Paul also gives a number of divine reasons for suffering. Suffering is a nursery for the growth (1) of compassion (v. 4), (2) of encouragement, and (3) of intensified hope (vv. 9–10).

A. SALUTATION (1:1–2)

1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus1 by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the church of God in Corinth, together with all the saints throughout Achaia: 2Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Typically, letters from the Greco-Roman period begin: A to B: greeting, followed by C, either a prayer or thanksgiving to God/the gods for the addressee. For example:

Ptolemaios to Kassianos his brother, very many greetings. Before everything I pray you are in good health.2

Paul follows this basic A, B, C format but also states (1) his office (“an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God”) and the fact and name of a co-sender,3 titled (“and Timothy the brother”), and (2) modifies the prayer along the lines of salutations found in Jewish letters.

The addressees are both “the church … in Corinth” and believers throughout the constituent Roman province (“all the saints in the whole of Achaia”), giving the letter a broader character than would be the case if the readership were merely the local assembly of believers in the capital city.

His insertion of specifically Christian elements—“apostle of Christ Jesus,” “Timothy the brother,” “to the church of God,” and “God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”—into this standard epistolary format serves immediately to confront readers ancient and modern with Christian distinctives.

God himself is dominant in the salutation (vv. 1–2), as well as in the introduction (vv. 1–11) as a whole. It is “by the will of God” that Paul is an apostle, who now writes to the “church of God.” Significantly, God—the God of Israel—is declared to be not only “our Father” but also, as carried through into the benediction, “the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (v. 3).

1 The first sentence of the letter—the apostle’s address to the church—with its implications of Paul’s authority over the Corinthians, encapsulates the major issue of the letter as it will unfold.

In earlier letters4 Paul does not mention “apostle” in the opening address but brackets Silvanus and Timothy with himself on equal terms and includes them with him as “apostles of Christ” (1 Thess 1:1; 2:6; 2 Thess 1:1). But from the time of the writing of 1 Corinthians—due to mounting questioning of his apostleship?—Paul declares himself to be an “apostle” in the salutation of his letters (cf. Gal 1:1; 1 Cor 1:1; Rom 1:1), and is careful to distance himself as an “apostle” from various coworkers (1 Cor 1:1; Col 1:1; but cf. Phil 1:1)—in this case, “Timothy our brother.”5 Timothy and Silvanus are linked with Paul as preachers to the Corinthians, but only Paul is an apostle (1:19).6

Although Timothy’s name is joined with Paul’s, we do not sense that he participates with Paul in the vigorous and passionate interchange with the Corinthian readers that is the chief subject of the letter. Although the first person plural pronouns “we,” “us,” “our” are very common in the letter,7 the various contexts tend either to be inconclusive in assessing the possible involvement of Timothy or imply rather strongly that Paul is using the plural of himself. Most likely Timothy is mentioned because he is a distinguished “brother” who happened to be present with Paul at the time of writing in Macedonia, rather than because Timothy is being actively included in what is being said—namely, the urgent relationship problems between Paul and the Corinthians. He is a co-sender rather than a coauthor.

There has been some debate over the social origins of the word “apostle,”8 by which Paul usually introduces himself to his readers. The word apostolos was used only infrequently in the Greek language prior to NT times.9 When we notice that Paul uses the word thirty-five out of the eighty times it occurs in the NT, it is evident that apostolos was important to him.

Earlier doubts about Paul’s apostleship by some of the Corinthians10 have apparently now hardened into opposition. This is attributable to the recent arrival of self-professed “ministers” or “apostles” (11:23, 13) who have launched a countermission against Paul (2:17–3:1; 11:4, 12) and who are, according to them, “superior” in ministry to Paul (11:5, 23; 12:11). By his opening words “Paul, an apostle … by the will of God,” he pointedly reminds the Corinthians that he is not an apostle by self-appointment but by divine appointment (cf. 10:8; 13:10).11 Moreover, he is “an apostle of Christ Jesus”; his authority is derived. In the First Letter, he wrote, “Christ sent (“apostled”—apesteilen) me” (1 Cor 1:17; cf. 1 Thess 2:6). Later in the present letter Paul makes a close connection between the Corinthians being “reconciled to God” and having their hearts widely “open” to Paul (5:20; 6:12). To reject the authority of the one who is an apostle “by the will of God” comes close to rejecting the authority of God/Christ, though Paul does not explicitly say so (cf. Mark 9:37, 41 pars.).12

What would the citizens of a Greco-Roman city like Corinth have understood by Paul’s address to them as “the church … in Corinth”? Today the word “church” carries many meanings—a building for religious worship, a congregation, a denomination, worldwide Christianity, the Christian faith—to mention only a few. But in Paul’s day—as used by Luke in an everyday sense in Acts 19—it bore the meaning of “an assembly,” whether an occasional assembly (such as the “assembly” of Ephesians in the city theater—Acts 19:32, 41) or an official assembly (such as the “legal assembly” of the city of Ephesus—Acts 19:39). It is presumed that these Corinthian readers would have understood “church” as meaning the plenary assembly of believers—as opposed to the constituent house meetings...