NOTES for Co1 10:10-11

The language of Paul's epistles at times becomes figurative, symbolic. In the Torah he finds examples suitable also for his contemporaries. It would seem that the event the apostle mentions and the church situation in Corinth resemble one another only conditionally. Although, of course, sin is always sin, and apostasy is always apostasy. But Paul speaks of more. He speaks of the inner connection not only of events, but also of the spiritual space within which they take place. Of that space which could be called the space of the Covenant.

The space of that union between God and the human being which, entering the flow of historical events, makes history sacred. And in this sacred history time flows nonlinearly, so that one can be related to events to which, at the level of ordinary cause-and-effect connections, one cannot have any relation. Such relations are described by symbols, within which the picture too is built not as it would be built according to the laws of linear or chronological perspective. It is in this sense that the apostle says that what was said about people who lived almost fifteen centuries before Christ's coming was also said about his contemporaries.

Because every theophany, every manifestation of God, whenever and wherever it takes place, is connected with that Kingdom which entered the world in fullness through Christ and in Christ. And, becoming partaker of the Kingdom and its life, every Christian begins to have a relation to all theophanies, wherever and whenever they occurred.

Therefore Christianity is not a person's private matter. It is deeply personal; it is founded on the personal and each time completely unique relationship of a concrete person with Christ. But once established, these relationships immediately acquire the same universal, cosmic scale that belongs to everything related to the Kingdom.

And every choice a Christian makes in his Christian life also becomes a choice of universal significance. This is what Paul reminds the addressees of his epistle about, some of whom appear to have found in Christianity only some comfortable niche for themselves, not thinking at all about what Christian life really is.