NOTES for Co1 5:9-6:11

Speaking about relations within the Corinthian church, Paul is surprised by the custom of Corinthian Christians suing in secular courts and choosing arbitrators not from among themselves, but from outside. Apparently, Corinth in those days was not very different from Athens or other Greek cities, whose inhabitants very often sued one another for all kinds of reasons, so that court cases, including cases involving arbitrators, were common there. Meanwhile, in the Synagogue there existed a rule, at that time still unwritten, according to which all disputes between faithful Jews, and there were no others then, had to be resolved inside their own community, either with the participation of an arbitrator or in the court of the rabbinate.

For Paul, as a Jew, it was also strange to see that matters which could perfectly well be resolved within one's own community were being taken outside by its members, who brought in both official courts and arbitrators with no relation to the church. The matter also lay in the fact that a secular court, whether official or arbitral, treated cases involving violations of commandments given by God much more leniently.

It is no accident that the apostle reminds the recipients of his letter that sinners do not inherit the Kingdom, meaning that this remains true even when a secular court does not condemn a person for violating those commandments, as often happened in pagan courts. In those times, when the Judeo-Christian tradition was dominant in the Church, a church court would surely have considered the same cases on the basis of the norms of the Torah, and the verdict of such a court could have differed noticeably from the verdict of a secular court. But that was not the only issue.

The apostle says directly: why are you suing at all? Would it not be better to leave the matter as it is, if you consider one another brothers? Indeed, brothers can "insist on their rights" and sue one another only when, in essence, they have already stopped being brothers. And Paul points to the many lawsuits among members of the Corinthian church as an obvious sign of spiritual trouble in the church community: if everything in this respect had been normal in the church of Corinth, then lawsuits of this kind would either not have existed at all, or would have been very few, and all matters would have been resolved within the community.

One wonders whether the Apostle Paul is afraid of airing dirty laundry in public. Why must believers not take their cases before unbelievers? Paul says that the very existence of quarrels between brothers is already fundamentally wrong. But if two believers lacked the patience and humility to resolve their conflicts themselves, it is wiser to seek counsel from members of their own community. Why? Merely because it is shameful? This matters too, I think: the conduct of Christians is, after all, a kind of testimony about the Church. But there is another point, probably more important. From what perspective is the matter considered? What comes first? Only a believer will set as a goal the attempt to see the problem from God’s point of view. That is why Paul calls believers to turn to their brothers for counsel.

Behind these words lies the great mystery of righteousness. If you are a disciple of the Crucified One, then it follows that it is proper to you, like a sheep, to be led to slaughter. And it is entirely improper to defend your rights in any court whatever. Someone is always taking something from us; someone is always to blame; someone has always offended us. The wisdom of Jesus' disciples is that either we ourselves try to stand up for ourselves, or we remain wronged and God stands up for us. And here, alas, compromise is impossible, when we trust in God but also ourselves seek a little help from the "strongmen of this world." Evil can be resisted only as the Teacher resisted it: by dying together with Him.

In his letter to the Corinthian church, Paul mentions very serious sins committed by some of its members. At the same time, the apostle considers it necessary to "deliver the one who has done such a thing to Satan." Such a proposal can sound strange, but only at first glance. If one sees the Church as Paul sees it, everything falls into place. For the apostle, the Church is not an organization and not even a religious community, but the body of Christ.

It is above all a spiritual reality, the manifestation of the Kingdom on earth, in our world, which is being transformed but has not yet been transformed to the end. And if a person is deprived of fellowship with the Church, if he is separated from the Kingdom, the consequences for him can be most serious: he has already shared in the life of the Kingdom, and rejecting it means spiritual death for him. Of course, one could say that many people know nothing at all about the Kingdom and live the life of this world without experiencing, as it appears, any special inconvenience. But these people have never known anything except that imitation of life in this world which they mistakenly consider real life.

Their souls and bodies have adapted to such a half-alive existence and function somehow in the corresponding mode, not allowing their owners to die completely. But if someone manages to live differently, then he is still living not only by the life of this world, but also in part by the life of the Kingdom, catching its breath. Now that it has drawn near, according to the Savior's word, it has become much easier to feel and catch this breath than it was before, before Christ's coming.

But for a person who has already tasted the full life of the Kingdom as part of the body of Christ, falling back means an almost inevitable spiritual, and even not only spiritual, catastrophe. Yet in the case of deliberate sin it is impossible to act otherwise. One thing is sin over which the sinner grieves and of which he repents, understanding that he has done something incompatible with his Christian life: here forgiveness and a return to the former state are possible. In the end, God wants the sinner's salvation, not his destruction.

But to save means first of all to deliver a person from everything that prevents him from living the life of the Kingdom, and therefore first of all from sin. If a person does not want to be delivered from anything, considering his sin the norm, then the Kingdom is closed to him. Not because God does not love him, but because he himself loves his sin more than himself, at least more than his true self, created in the image and likeness of God. And here nothing more can be done: a person is free and chooses for himself what is dearer to him. And he bears all the consequences of his choice.