TRANSITORIO DE REFORMA DE FECHA 27 DE FEBRERO DE 2015.

struggling. Paul acknowledges that the converts need to be sensitive to the needs of the weak.555 _{In regards to food sacrificed to idols in 1 Cor.}

8:1-13,556 _{Paul advises the community to Òtake care that this right of yours}

does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak.Ó Paul goes on

555 _{Also found in Romans and 1 Thessalonians. For the strong and the weak in Romans,} see Reasoner (1999), 1 Thessalonians, see Burke (2003) pp.225-249.

556 _{See Thiselton (2000) pp.617-620 for a detailed discussion of the meaning of} eivdwlo,quton.

to advise in 8:9-13 not to do something (eat meat sacrificed to idols) that would cause a weaker believer to stumble in his or her faith.557

Paul wants the community to be sensitive to the fact that others are weaker and need special care in their faith.558 _{In this case, sensitivity to}

food sacrificed to idols needs to be considered as those weaker in faith would have their faith affected in a negative manner.

The unit of 1 Cor. 12-14 sheds light on community.559 _{Paul wants}

the Corinthians to know that they are dependent on each other and need each other to grow.560 _{Because of the problems in the church, like}

disunity, Paul needed to refocus his converts on their need for one another. The essence of the pericopeÕs contribution to community can be summed up in 1 Corinthians 12:7 ÒBut to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.Ó561 _{Each member must be allowed to express}

their gift for this to occur. Romans 12:6-8 also has this tone,

557 _{Hall (2003) p.192 writes, ÒInsistence on oneÕs personal rights can prove hurtful to} other Christians, and thus be a sin against Christ. He illustrates this by describing his approach to his own rights. As an apostle, he has the right o claim support from the church, but has chosen not to exercise that right for fear it should become a hindrance to the gospel (v.12).Ó

558 _{See also Hall (2003) p.47.}

559 _{Thiselton (2000) p.900 writes, ÒToo many writers treat 12:1-14:40 as if it were simply} an ad hoc response to questions about spiritual gifts (or spiritual persons) rather than as an address to this topic within the broader theological framework of 11:2-14:40 in deliberate continuity with 8:1-11:1, and indeed ultimately with 1:1-4:21.Ó Hall (2003) p. 74 writes, ÒThe whole of 1 Corinthians is an attempt to turn the Corinthian mindset from an individualistic, competitive assertion of oneÕs own gifts and rights into an ethic of consideration for others.Ó I am in agreement with Hall and feel Thiselton should extend his pericope to include chapters 15 and 16 of 1 Corinthians.

560 _{See Thiselton (2006) p.197.}

561 _{There is a strong tone of the divine agency as well. See Thiselton (2000) pp.935-936} for good discussion of the grammar of the verse and the divine agency. Taken from NAS version as well as Romans 12:6-8.

Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us,

each of us is to exercise them accordingly: if prophecy, according

to the proportion of his faith; if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; or he who exhorts, in his exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.

Paul illustrates the CorinthiansÕ dependence on one another in 1

Corinthians 12:12 comparing the Corinthian church to the human body. Though the members of the church are many, they should see themselves as one body like the human body is one and Christ is one.562 _Thiselton

writes,

To drive home this principle Paul borrows, but also then reverses, an application of the imagery of the body long known and used in Greco-Roman politics and rhetoric. From the fourth and fifth centuries B.C. through the first century up to the second, Plato, Plutarch, and Epictetus. . . . used the image of the body to promote the need for harmony where there was diversity of status. . . All Christian believers constitute a single body (v.12); to suggest otherwise is to denigrate or tear apart the very limbs of Christ (v. 12b).563

In 1 Cor. 12:14, Paul tells the Corinthians that the body is not just one member but many. There may have been an overemphasis on one or more members and Paul wants the church as a whole to see everyone as

important. 1 Cor.12:15-25 goes into this dependence by comparing the

562 _{Martin (1995) p.94 writes, ÒPaulÕs use of the body analogy in 1 Corinthians 12:12-27} stands squarely in the Greco-Roman rhetorical tradition.Ó Martin comments on how Paul uses status terms and that Paul relates the body analogy to a hierarchy of high and low status believers but he is not using them as they are but, in Pauline fashion, sought a reversal of the way they were used. Martin (1995) p.103 writes, ÒHe identifies with the strong and calls on them to consider the weak.Ó

church to specific body parts and illustrating the foolishness to

overemphasize one member over others but to communicate that everyone in the church body has a gift and value and contributes to the communityÕs growth.564 _{Paul again communicates this interdependence on one another}

by stating that if one part of the body suffers, they all suffer and the converse is also true that if one member is blessed, this is good for the church as a whole. Paul emphasizes again in 1 Cor. 12:27 that the church is part of ChristÕs body. 1 Cor. 13 moves away from gifts and focuses on the primacy of love over gifts.565 _{Though gifts are important, Paul wants}

his converts to do what is most important, loving each other. Gifts are to be used for the edification of the church. oivkodome,w in 1 Cor. 14:4566 _{can mean Ò(a) literally building, construction; (b) figuratively, of}

spiritual encouragement making more able, edifying, building up.Ó567

564 _{See also Thiselton (2006) p.209-210.}

565 _{On the issue of Isis followers and 1 Cor. 13, see Witt (1971) pp.255-268. Witt (1971)} p.263 writes, ÒThe triad of Christian virtues, Faith, Hope and Love, so eloquently praised in Corinthians, is introduced in such a way as to suggest that the writer of what is obviously an aretalogy is taking a close look at contemporary cults. He mentions the gift of tongues, a gift on which much stress is laid in the New Testament. The followers of Isis held that she controlled the various tongues, Òdialects,Ó that prevailed in the world.Ó There is no other section in the undisputed or the disputed letters of Paul that deal with this issue so thoroughly. Maybe the closest comes in 1 Thess. 5:19-21. But it is also clear that the main issue Paul was addressing was orderliness in worship 1 Cor. 14:20-33 and the cult of Isis, if it is on PaulÕs mind, was not a huge issue in the pericope but a side issue at best.

566 _{Derrett (1997) p.130 writes,}

No one doubts, in the context, but that Paul is using foundation-laying not only as a metaphor (as at 1 Cor. 14:4) for the commencement of a religious

community, but also the better-known metaphor of introductory teaching, a Òfoundation-course.Ó Philo talks of an introductory exegesis upon which one can raise a structure by means of allegory as a master-builderÕs work, and such metaphors are acceptable.