1 Cor 2:1. And I, when I came to you, brothers, came not in loftiness of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of Christ.
He had said above that he was sent to evangelize not in the wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power; he now teaches that this is precisely what he practiced among the Corinthians, and at the same time in a certain way proves from his own conduct what he had said—that God chose the foolish things of the world and the weak things—also with respect to the office of evangelical preaching. By this he tacitly reproves certain teachers among the Corinthians who, in preaching the Gospel, were displaying their eloquence together with secular wisdom.
Accordingly, some rightly explain: I came not in loftiness of speech or of wisdom. “In loftiness” (in Greek καθ’ ὑπεροχήν), that is, “according to” or “by way of eminence,” as is also found in some older Latin commentators. Ambrose reads cum eminentia, which Erasmus follows.
Proclaiming to you the testimony of Christ. In Greek it reads the testimony of God, and in some manuscripts the mystery of God, which Ambrose also reads and interprets. Hence it is clear that in some Greek copies μυστήριον (“mystery”) was written, although μαρτύριον (“testimony”) is, I think, the more genuine reading, so that the sense is this: when I came to you as a witness of Christ, namely to announce to you the Gospel—which is the testimony concerning Christ, that is, about Christ—and according to the commission laid upon me, I showed no eminence of eloquence or secular wisdom in my preaching, but, using simple speech and aided by no apparatus of human philosophy, I preached Christ to you.
It is asked whether Paul could have preached, had he wished, with loftiness of speech and secular wisdom. Chrysostom denies this, and Theophylact and Oecumenius follow him, claiming that Paul was in fact unskilled in speech and wholly lacking in external wisdom. But although it is clear from Paul’s own testimony in 2 Corinthians 11 that in a certain sense he admits himself to be unskilled in speech (the sense of which will be explained elsewhere), nevertheless it is sufficiently probable that he had read Greek poets, orators, and philosophers, and thus was not wholly inexperienced in secular wisdom. Yet he did not display such wisdom among the Corinthians, nor did he present himself as knowing anything of that sort, being content to conduct the work of evangelical preaching simply, in the manner of the other apostles of Christ, since this at that time better served the promotion of God’s glory.
This explanation is confirmed by what follows immediately, for he does not say “I did not know,” but:
1 Cor 2:2. For I judged not to know anything among you.
The word me is not added in the Greek but is understood; Tertullian (De Pudicitia, ch. 14) and Hilary (De Trinitate, bk. 10) cite it without me. Some translate: “For I resolved to know nothing for knowing’s sake among you.” This interpreter had regard to the article τοῦ prefixed to the infinitive εἰδέναι, though Greek commentators seem to disregard the force of that article. Some manuscripts indeed do not recognize it. But whether added or omitted, the sense remains the same, namely: I determined to conduct myself among you in such a way that I seemed to know nothing else. Or, according to others: “I judged,” that is, I concealed among you any knowledge I might have; I did not declare myself to know anything else.
Except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. This does not mean that he taught nothing among the Corinthians except the single article of Christ’s crucifixion. For he also taught other articles of faith and carefully inculcated doctrine pertaining to Christian moral life, as Augustine clearly shows (De fide et operibus, ch. 10). Rather, he first removes from his preaching among them both rhetorical ornament and admixture of secular wisdom, and then also the higher and more hidden doctrine of the Christian religion, which he later calls “wisdom,” because the Corinthians were not yet capable of it. To them, therefore, only the rudiments of faith were to be delivered at the beginning—rudiments which he calls “Jesus Christ and him crucified.”
Francis the Abbot (De gratia Dei, vol. 12) beautifully hints at this sense: Paul feeds little ones in Christ with milk, but strengthens those mature in faith with solid food; among the former he judges that he knows nothing except Christ and him crucified, among the latter he discusses heavenly secrets and mysteries hidden from the world. Bernard understood this similarly (Sermon to the Knights Templar, ch. 6), as did Hugh of St. Victor in his questions on this passage.
The sense, then, is this: Nakedly, simply, and without pomp of speech or display of secular wisdom, as though I knew nothing else, I handed on to you the rudimentary doctrine of Christ, diligently inculcating this foundation—that Jesus Christ was crucified and died for us, and that salvation cannot be obtained except through this faith—while reserving the exposition of deeper and more secret mysteries of faith for another time. This sense accords with what follows: But we speak wisdom among the perfect, especially what is said toward the end of this chapter and the beginning of the next.
From this it is also clear that he does not truly preach Christ crucified who merely proposes the cross as something to be imitated, but rather he who teaches that glorying is to be found in nothing other than the cross of Christ, following Paul’s own example when he says (Gal 6): Far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Cor 2:3. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling.
In the Greek, the preposition ἐν (“in”) is repeated in the second and third instances. Fear and trembling differ in that fear belongs to the soul, trembling to the body, the latter being the effect of the former. Yet whenever they are joined together in Scripture, they usually signify anxiety in carrying out a task together with fear of giving offense, as in Psalm 2: Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling, and Philippians 2: Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
We have treated the various meanings of “weakness” in Scripture in the commentary on Romans, chapter 5. In this place, some understand bodily weakness opposed to health; but others, more correctly, interpret weakness as that which is opposed to power, though they differ among themselves. Chrysostom and other Greek fathers think the Apostle is speaking of persecutions and dangers which he suffered at Corinth, since these are called “weaknesses” in 2 Corinthians 11 and 12. Others—whose view I prefer—take “weakness” here to mean humility of conduct, of which he says in 2 Corinthians 10: Though humble in appearance among you, and because of which it was said of him, as he himself reports in the same place: His bodily presence is weak. He again refers to this in chapter 13 of the same epistle: We rejoice when we are weak. This sense also corresponds to what was said above: God chose the weak things of the world to confound the strong. Finally, he seems to mean the same thing in Galatians 4 when he says: It was because of bodily weakness that I preached the Gospel to you formerly.
Thus the sense is: when I preached the Gospel to you, I not only used humble speech without any admixture of secular wisdom, but I also conducted myself in a thoroughly humble manner, laboring with my own hands, not using the authority the Lord had given me, and in all this being anxious lest I should do anything in word or deed by which you might be offended and fall away from the faith you had received. In sum, he teaches that he behaved among the Corinthians with humility not only in speech but also in person.
1 Cor 2:4. And my speech and my preaching.
That is, the discourse which I employed in preaching the Gospel—for the phrase is used appositionally.
Not in persuasive words of human wisdom. “Persuasive” (πειθοῖς in Greek), that is, suasive or persuasive, fitted and arranged for persuasion—although properly speaking, “persuasive” means that which can be persuaded. And although in Greek the same word λόγος is used for “speech” and “words” (λόγοις), the Latin translator deliberately varied the terms, seeing that they could not be taken in exactly the same sense. Erasmus followed this, though Valla objected without good reason.
The sense is: My speech, by which I preached Christ among you, was not composed of words and arguments adapted to persuasion through admixture of human wisdom. Some explain: In preaching Christ I did not employ verbal ornament by which human wisdom seeks to commend itself. But the former sense is better, for he intends to exclude from his preaching not only rhetorical ornament but secular wisdom itself. He repeats this rejection of secular wisdom in order to add what follows:
But in demonstration of the Spirit and of power. This is a figure of speech called hendiadys: “Spirit and power” meaning “the power of the Spirit,” namely, of the Holy Spirit, which the Holy Spirit supplies. The sense is: My preaching, though lacking human art of persuasion, was nevertheless effective, because it was accompanied by the power of the Holy Spirit, manifested through miracles as certain testimonies of the truth of what I preached.
One may ask: if Paul rightly neglected persuasive words, why do not all preachers of the word of God imitate him in this, since we see them rather striving to imitate Queen Esther, who prayed that God would place fitting speech in her mouth to incline the king’s heart (Esther 14)? The answer is that this is ordinarily the proper way of persuading and moving listeners—to use words carefully composed for that end—and therefore such means should not be neglected unless it is clear that God wishes to move people by another method for their salvation, as it pleased him in the beginning to have the Gospel preached by the apostles in simple and unadorned speech and to convert the nations thereby. This was for the reason expressed in the preceding chapter and repeated in the words that follow:
1 Cor 2:5. So that your faith might not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
That is, so that your faith might not be attributed to human wisdom (the same applies to eloquence), but that all might recognize this work as belonging solely to divine power.
Once faith has been established, however, it was fitting to return to the ordinary and customary method of persuasion—yet always believing what is said in the next chapter: Neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but God who gives the increase.
CONTINUE
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