New Testament

1 Corinthians

1 Corinthians is Paul’s letter to a gifted but divided young church in the Roman city of Corinth. He answers reports and questions about factions, sexual sin, lawsuits, marriage, food offered to idols, worship, spiritual gifts and the resurrection, and he brings every issue back to “Christ crucified” () and to love that builds others up. It is in the Bible because it shows the gospel reshaping the ordinary life of a church in a pagan city, and because it preserves one of the earliest written summaries of Jesus’ death, burial, resurrection and appearances ().

Author: Paul, with “our brother Sosthenes” named as co-sender (1:1). Scholars of every school accept it as Paul’s own letter.
Audience: The church Paul planted in Corinth during his long stay there (Acts 18:1–18), mostly Gentile with some Jewish believers, and with only a few members who were wise, powerful or of noble birth (1:26). Some had written to him with questions (7:1), while others brought reports of quarrels (1:11).
When: Probably around AD 53–55, while Paul was staying in Ephesus until Pentecost (16:8). It was not his first letter to them, since he mentions an earlier one (5:9).
Where: Corinth was a busy Roman colony on the narrow isthmus of southern Greece, destroyed by Rome in 146 BC and refounded by Julius Caesar in 44 BC. It was known for trade, the Isthmian Games and many temples, which explains questions about idol meals.
Genre: 1 Corinthians is a real letter written to a real church, answering problems one after another. Chapters 1–6 respond mainly to reports Paul has heard, and from 7:1 he takes up the questions the Corinthians wrote to him, each introduced by the phrase “now concerning” or “now about” (7:1, 7:25, 8:1, 12:1, 16:1, 16:12). Paul argues like a pastor and a debater: he often quotes a Corinthian slogan and then qualifies it, as with the claim that everything is permissible (6:12, 10:23). Read each section as an answer to a specific situation, then trace the principle Paul uses to answer it.

Shape of the book

Divisions and the Wisdom of the Cross · ch 1–4Rival loyalties to Paul, Apollos and Cephas are answered by the message of the cross, which overturns human wisdom, and by a right view of ministers as servants of Christ.
Immorality, Lawsuits and the Body · ch 5–6Paul confronts a case of incest the church tolerated, believers suing one another, and visits to prostitutes, reminding them that their bodies belong to the Lord.
Marriage and Singleness · ch 7Answering their letter, Paul treats marriage, sexual duty, divorce, singleness and remarriage, distinguishing the Lord’s command from his own counsel.
Food Offered to Idols and Christian Freedom · ch 8–10Knowledge must give way to love for weaker believers; Paul gives up his own rights, warns from Israel’s wilderness failures, and forbids sharing in idol feasts.
Order and Love in Gathered Worship · ch 11–14Head coverings, a divided Lord’s Supper, the many gifts of one body, the supremacy of love, and the orderly use of prophecy and tongues.
The Resurrection of Christ and of the Dead · ch 15Paul restates the gospel, shows that Christ’s resurrection guarantees the resurrection of His people, and describes the imperishable body and the defeat of death.
The Collection, Travel Plans and Greetings · ch 16Instructions for the gift to Jerusalem, plans for visits by Paul, Timothy and Apollos, and closing greetings.

Themes

The Cross Overturns Human Wisdom. Corinth prized eloquence, status and clever speakers, and the church had absorbed those values. Paul answers that “the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (). God chose the weak and lowly so that “no one may boast in His presence” ().
One Body, Many Members. The church is one body made up of different members, each given gifts by the same Spirit for the common good (, ). Factions (), lawsuits () and a Lord’s Supper where the poor go hungry () all deny that unity.
Love That Builds Up. Paul sets love against a kind of knowledge that puffs up (). He gives up his own rights for the sake of the gospel (, ), places the great chapter on love between two chapters on spiritual gifts (), and judges every activity in worship by whether it builds up the church ().
Holiness in the Body. Some in Corinth seem to have thought what they did with their bodies did not matter. Paul answers that the body is a temple of the Holy Spirit and that believers were bought at a price (), so sexual sin and idol feasts are serious matters for the whole church (, ).
Already, But Not Yet. The Corinthians acted as if they had already arrived and were reigning (). Paul keeps pointing ahead: they await the revelation of the Lord (), now see only a dim reflection (), and their bodies will be raised imperishable at the last trumpet ().

Where Christ is

Paul resolved to know nothing among the Corinthians except Christ crucified (), and he measures every problem by the cross. Christ is “the power of God and the wisdom of God” (), our Passover lamb, the giver of the new covenant at His table, and the risen last Adam whose resurrection is the firstfruits of the harvest to come.

Christ Our Passover. Type and fulfillment. At Passover Israel removed all leaven from their houses (). Paul tells the church to clear out the old leaven of tolerated sin because Christ, the Passover lamb, has already been sacrificed (), so their life together should be a festival of sincerity and truth. (; ; )
The Rock in the Wilderness. Type, named by Paul. Israel passed through the sea, ate manna and drank from the rock, yet most of them fell in the wilderness. Paul says these things happened as examples for the church, and that the spiritual rock that accompanied them “was Christ” (). (; ; )
The New Covenant in His Blood. Fulfillment. Paul hands on what he received from the Lord: “This cup is the new covenant in My blood” (). The words echo the covenant blood at Sinai and fulfill the new covenant promised through Jeremiah, and each celebration proclaims the Lord’s death until He comes (). (; ; )
The Firstfruits and the Last Adam. Type and fulfillment. Christ’s resurrection is “the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (), recalling the first sheaf offered to God as a pledge of the full harvest. Paul quotes , “The first man Adam became a living being,” and calls Christ the last Adam, who brings life where Adam brought death (, ). (; ; ; )
Death Swallowed Up in Victory. Promise and fulfillment. Paul applies and to Christ’s reign until every enemy is under His feet, with death as the last enemy (). At the resurrection the prophets’ words will come to pass: death swallowed up in victory () and death’s sting removed (). (; ; ; ; ; )

Voices

Clement of Rome. Writing to the same church near the end of the first century, when it had again split into factions, he told them to take up Paul’s letter once more, since Paul had already rebuked their partisanship over himself, Cephas and Apollos.

Reading well, key terms and common misreadings

Read it well

Notice the seams. Chapters 1–6 answer reports (1:11, 5:1), and from 7:1 Paul answers the Corinthians’ letter, marking each new question with “now concerning” or “now about.”
Watch for slogans Paul quotes before correcting them, such as the claims that everything is permissible (6:12, 10:23) and that an idol is nothing (8:4). Translations differ on where to put quotation marks.
Read chapter 13 in its place. It sits between two chapters on spiritual gifts and was written to correct a church competing over gifts.
Keep the city in view: temple dining rooms (8:10), meat sold after sacrifice (10:25), patrons and clients, and admired public speakers all lie behind Paul’s instructions.
Read chapter 15 as the climax. Many of the earlier problems, from contempt for the body to arrogance about already reigning, are answered by the coming resurrection.

Key terms

Wisdom σοφία (sophia) — In chapters 1–3 Paul contrasts the wisdom of this age, prized in Greek rhetoric and philosophy, with God’s wisdom revealed in the crucified Christ (1:24, 1:30, 2:6–7).
Spiritual πνευματικός (pneumatikos) — A word the Corinthians seem to have prized for themselves. Paul redefines it: the truly spiritual person is taught by the Spirit and accepts the apostle’s word as the Lord’s command (2:14–15, 3:1, 14:37).
Gift χάρισμα (charisma) — A gift of grace. Paul uses it for the varied abilities the Spirit gives each member for the common good (12:4–11), not as a badge of spiritual rank.
Love ἀγάπη (agapē) — Self-giving care for others. Chapter 13 defines it by actions, patience, kindness, not envying, keeping no account of wrongs, and calls it greater than faith and hope (13:4–7, 13:13).
Body σῶμα (sōma) — Used for the physical body that belongs to the Lord (6:13–20), for Christ’s body given at the Supper (11:24), for the church as Christ’s body (12:27), and for the resurrection body (15:44).
Resurrection ἀνάστασις (anastasis) — Standing up again from death. Paul insists on a bodily resurrection, sown perishable and raised imperishable, not merely the survival of the soul (15:12–13, 15:42–44).

Easy to misread

Treating 14:34–35 as a ban on women ever speaking in worship, as though 11:5 did not assume that women pray and prophesy. Because Paul allows both, most readers look for a narrower meaning: some take it to bar women from weighing the prophecies (14:29), some see disruptive questions that belong at home (14:35), and others link it to the limit on teaching in 1 Timothy 2:12. A few scholars think the verses were added later, because some Western manuscripts place them after 14:40, though every known manuscript includes them. Read it alongside 11:5 and Paul’s stated goal of order (14:33, 14:40).
Assuming the meaning of 11:2–16 is obvious. Interpreters debate whether “head” means authority, source or both (11:3), and whether the covering is a garment or long hair (11:15). Complementarian readers find a lasting order between man and woman grounded in creation (11:8–9), while egalitarian readers stress that in the Lord neither is independent of the other (11:11–12). Some churches still practice head covering, while most treat it as the cultural sign of an abiding principle.
Reading 13:8–12 as a settled timetable for spiritual gifts. Cessationists hold that tongues and prophecy ended with the apostolic age, though many of them take “the perfect” as Christ’s return, while continuationists hold that the gifts continue until then. Whatever one concludes, Paul’s point is that every gift is partial and temporary, but love never fails.
Using “baptized for the dead” (15:29) to support baptism by proxy. Paul mentions a practice of some people without approving it, its meaning is uncertain, and he raises it only to show that their own behavior assumes the resurrection.

Further reading: David Guzik, Enduring Word · Matthew Henry on CCEL · BibleProject overview video