NOTES for Co1 8:1-6

Speaking about food offered to idols, Paul remains faithful to the revelation he received and to his experience of the Kingdom. He states plainly that for its inhabitants idols and pagan gods are nothing and may simply be ignored (v. 4). The apostle does not even attempt to examine the subtleties of foreign beliefs; he merely reminds us that in heaven and on earth there are many beings considered gods and rulers ("lords", v. 5), although anyone who has received revelation must know that there is only one true God (v. 6). Such an approach is possible only when a person's relationship with the Creator is no longer defined by any religion, as happens to everyone who lives in the Kingdom: religion is no longer needed there, because people commune with God directly.

Yet this knowledge can be either true or imaginary. It is not by chance that Paul contrasts knowledge, which puffs up, with love, which builds up (v. 1), adding that genuine knowledge is given only to those who love God (vv. 2-3).

The issue here is the difference between spiritual freedom, so familiar and intelligible to the inhabitants of the Kingdom, and religious indifference, widespread both in Paul's day and in ours. Outwardly, both groups treated with equal unconcern the fact that all provisions bought in city markets had been offered to idols: markets were usually under the patronage of one pagan god or another, and everything sold there was formally regarded as dedicated to that deity. But their reasons were exactly opposite. For inhabitants of the Kingdom, permeated by the breath of God, everything connected with pagan gods was no more real than a mirage in the desert. The religiously indifferent simply did not care which gods the food on the market was dedicated to, or whether it was dedicated at all. This deceptive outward similarity could sometimes confuse religious people, who cared very much to whom the food placed on their table had been dedicated.