rious a forced celibacy would be in a church like the Corinthian, and hence sought to guard against this evil. He represented a single life for those who were fitted for it by their natural constitution, as a means of attending with less distraction to the concerns of the kingdom of God, without being diverted from them by earthly cares, especially under the great impending tribulations, until the second coming of Christ, from which we must infer what an influence the near approach of that event had on his own course of conduct. He placed the essence of Christian perfection not in celibacy, nor in the outward denial of earthly things; but in that renunciation of the world which has its seat in the disposition, which would make the married and the rich, as well as the unmarried and the poor, ready to sacrifice every thing which the exigencies of the times might demand; to suffer the loss of all things, however dear to their hearts, for the sake of the gospel; 1 Cor. vii. 30.

In speaking of the various relations of life, in which men might be placed at the time of their conversion, Paul lays down as a rule, that that event should produce no change in this respect. Christianity did not violently dissolve the relation in which a man found himself placed by birth, education, and the leading of divine Providence, but taught him to act in them from a new point of view, and with a new disposition. It effected no abrupt revolutions, but gradually, by the power of the Spirit working from within, made all things new. The apostle applies this especially to the case of slaves, which it was more needful to consider, because from the beginning that gospel which was preached to the poor found much acceptance among this class, and the knowledge imparted to them by Christianity of the common dignity and rights of all men, might easily have excited them to throw off their earthly yoke. Likewise in this view, Christianity, in order not to mingle worldly and spiritual things together, and not to miss its main object, the salvation of the soul, did not presume to effect by force a sudden revolution in their condition, but operated only on the mind and disposition. To slaves the gospel presented a

higher life, which exalted them above the restraints of their earthly relation; and though masters were not required by the apostles to give their slaves freedom, since it was foreign to their ministry to interfere with the arrangement of civil relations, yet Christianity imparted to masters such a knowledge of their duties to their slaves, and such dispositions towards them, and taught them to recognise as brethren the Christians among their slaves, in such a manner as to make their relation to them quite a different thing.

Paul, therefore, when he touches on this relation, tells the slave, that though by the arrangement of Providence he was debarred from the enjoyment of outward freedom, he should not be troubled, but rejoice that the Lord had bestowed upon him true inward freedom. But while he considers the latter as the only true freedom, in the possession of which man may be free under all outward restraints, and apart from which no true freedom can exist, he is very far from overlooking the subordinate worth of civil freedom, for he says to the slave, to whom he had announced the true, the spiritual freedom, "but if thou mayst be free, use it rather," 1 Cor. vii. 21,* which im

The

*The later ascetic spirit forms a striking contrast on this point to the spirit of primitive Christianity. Although, in a grammatical view, it is most natural to supply the iλcudigos Yevada which immediately precedes, or iλsusga, yet the later Fathers have not thus understood it, because the worth of civil freedom appeared to them not so great, but they took the apostle's meaning to be exactly opposite, uãdλov xeñoaι tā Sourg. What De Wette has lately urged against this interpretation, does not appear to me convincing. The i na (he thinks) is against it; but it suits very well. apostle says, If called, being a slave to Christianity, thou shouldst be content. Christian freedom will not be injured by slavery-but yet, if thou canst be free (as a still additional good, which if thou dost not attain, be satisfied without it; but which, if offered to thee, is not to be despised) therefore make use of this opportunity of becoming free, rather than by neglecting it to remain a slave. The connection with v. 22, is not against it, if we recollect, that the clause beginning with aλa is only a secondary or qualifying assertion, which certainly does not belong to the leading thought,

plies that the apostle viewed the state of freedom as more corresponding to the Christian calling, and that Christianity, when it so far gained the ascendency as to form anew the social relations of mankind, would bring about this change of state, which he declares to be an object of preference.*

The Corinthian church had probably requested that Apollos might visit them again, and Paul acknowledged him as a faithful teacher, who had built on the foundation of the faith which he had laid, who had watered the field that he had planted. He was far from opposing

a mode of construction, similar to what we find elsewhere in Paul's writings.

To this also the words in v. 23 may relate. "Ye are bought with a price (ye are made free from the dominion of Satan and sin), become not the slaves of men." Thus it would be understood by many. Christians ought not voluntarily, merely to escape from some earthly trouble, to put themselves in a condition which is not suited to their Christian calling. But since the apostle previously, when speaking of such relations as could only concern individuals in the church, used the singular, but now changed his style to the plural, it is hence probable, that he is speaking of a relation of a general kind, that is, giving an exhortation which would apply to all the Corinthians, an exhortation, indeed, which is not so closely connected with what is said in v. 22, but to which he might easily have been led to make from the idea of a δουλος χριστου, so familiar and interesting to his mind, an idea that would equally apply to both bond and free; "Refuse not this true freedom which belongs to you as the bondsmen of Christ, do not become by a spiritual dependence the slaves of men, from being the bondsmen of Christ;"-an exhortation which was adapted in many respects to the condition of the Corinthian church; and this warning against a servitude totally incompatible with being a servant (or bondsman) of Christ, (which could not be asserted of a state of outward servitude, or slavery, simply as such) this warning would be a very suitable conclusion to the whole train of thought on inward and outward freedom. It was needless for him to notice the case of a person selling himself for a slave, since it was one that could hardly occur among Christians. Verse 24 is rather for than against this interpretation; for since v. 23 does not refer to outward relations, he once more repeats the injunction respecting them.

this request; he even requested Apollos to comply with it, but Apollos was resolved not to visit Corinth immediately. The importance attached to his person, and the efforts that had been made to place him at the head of a party, perhaps led him to this determination.

Paul wrote our First Epistle to the Corinthians about the time of the Jewish Passover, as appears from the allusion in v. 7. He had then the intention of staying at Ephesus till Pentecost; he informed them that many opportunities offered for publishing the gospel, but that he had also many enemies to contend with. He spoke of his being in daily peril of losing his life; 1 Cor. xv. 30.*

At the time of his writing this Epistle to Corinth, he had formed an extensive plan for his future labours. As during his stay of several years in Achaia and at Ephesus, he had laid a sufficient foundation for the extension

Schrader infers from the words in 1 Cor. xvi. 8, that Paul could not have written this epistle at the close of his long residence at Ephesus, but at the beginning of another short stay there; for otherwise he must have said, iva de ἐν Έφεσῳ ἐτι, and could not have hoped to effect that in a few weeks for the spread of the gospel, and the counteraction of false teachers, which he could not accomplish even after several years. But we do not see why Paul, merely having the future in his eye and not reflecting on the past, might not leave out the ir, as similar omissions frequently occur in an epistolary writing; and even if Paul in the course of a long time had effected much for the spread of the gospel, still he could say, since the sphere of his labours in Lesser Asia was continually extending, that "a great and effectual door" was opened for publishing the gospel. But the aveμevos in this passage, which relates to the publication of the gospel, are certainly not false teachers, but open adversaries of Christianity. As the opportunities for making known the gospel were manifold, so also its enemies were many. This, therefore, does not contradict the preceding longer evidence of the apostle, but rather confirms it; for the most violent attacks on the preachers of the gospel, if they did not proceed from the Jews, would first arise, after by their long continued labours they had produced effects which threatened to injure the interests of many whose gains were derived from idolatrous practices.

of the Christian church among the nations who used the Greek language, he now wished to transfer his ministry to the West; and as it was his fundamental principle to make those regions the scene of his activity where no one had laboured before him-he wished on that account to visit Rome, the metropolis of the world, where a Church had long since been established, in his way to Spain,* and then to commence the publication of the gospel at the extremity of Western Europe. But before putting this plan into execution, he wished to obtain a munificent collection in the churches of the Gentile Christians for their poor believing brethren at Jerusalem, and to bring the amount himself to Jerusalem accompanied by some members of the churches. Already some time before he dispatched this Epistle to the Corinthians, he had sent Timothy and some others to Macedonia and Achaia to forward this collection, and to counterwork the dis

* Rom. xv. 24, 28. Dr Baur, in his Essay on the Object and Occasion of the Epistle to the Romans, in the " Tubinger Zeitschrift für Theologie," 1836, part iii. p. 156, has attempted to shew that Paul could not have written these words. He thinks that he discovers in them the marks of another hand, of which, in my opinion, no trace whatever can be found,all appears wholly Pauline. It might indeed seem strange, that the apostle of the Gentiles had not yet visited the metropolis of the Gentile world. Accordingly, he gives an account of the causes which had hitherto prevented him, and expresses his earnest desire to become personally acquainted with the church of the metropolis. Since it was most important, first of all, to lay a foundation every where for the publication of the gospel, on which the superstructure might afterwards be easily raised, so it was his maxim-the same which he expresses in 2 Cor. x. 16, and which we see him always acting upon-to labour only in those regions where no one before had published the gospel. But among the Gentiles at Rome a church had been long founded, and hence he could not be justified on his own principles in leaving a field of labour in which there was still so much to be done, in order to visit a church that had been long established, and was in a state of progressive development. The difficulties which Baur finds in this passage are only created by a false interpretation.