NOTES for Co2 11:16-33

Describing his life and ministry, Paul says that he has more grounds for boasting and self-assertion than most of those who think themselves entitled to boast and assert themselves at the expense of the Corinthian Christians. Indeed, for the Church, for genuine witness to Christ and to the Kingdom, Paul did more than any of those in Corinth who claimed the title of teachers and apostles and, on that basis, demanded respect, honor, and material support for themselves. Moreover, judging from the apostle's words, their demands at times took rather crude forms, and in dealing with the brothers they could be quite arrogant.

Plainly, these people really imagined themselves to be teachers and apostles, and at the same time were certain that such a status gave them certain special rights in the church community, rights they had no intention of neglecting. For Paul, however, this behavior was evidence precisely that they had no understanding of Christian life, because Jesus told His disciples more than once that in the Kingdom the highest and most important place belongs to the one who bears the most difficult and responsible ministries, the one on whom greater responsibility rests.

The measure of responsibility, not status, determines a person's rights and possibilities in the Kingdom, and therefore in the Church. If the situation in a particular church community turns out otherwise, then one has to speak of the "folly" of its members, who tolerate such "teachers" and "apostles" and give them places of honor and power over themselves.

This, of course, is not some lack of sense in the everyday meaning of the word; by the standards of this world the Corinthian situation was quite understandable and sensible. It is a failure by the members of the Corinthian church community to understand the fundamental laws of spiritual life in general and Christian life in particular. Otherwise it is impossible to explain why they allowed their teachers and mentors to "enslave" them, "devour" them, "take advantage" of them, and "strike them in the face."

Even if we suppose that Paul is exaggerating somewhat and speaking figuratively, the situation still becomes clear enough: the Corinthian Christians evidently think that their "teachers" have the right to treat them this way because they are "teachers." But precisely this attitude toward their teachers and mentors testifies to the spiritual "folly" of the Corinthian Christians, to their failure to understand what relationships in the Church should be like, if we are speaking of the Church with a capital C.