2 Corinthians 11:16-32

CRITICAL NOTES

2 Corinthians 11:16. Again.—After 2 Corinthians 11:1. “You can very well let a foolish fellow like me be in the fashion, and do a bit of boasting.”

2 Corinthians 11:17. After the Lord.—Not to be compared with 1 Corinthians 7:10; 1 Corinthians 7:25. (See Critical Notes and Bible-class Note there.) Compare rather “After Rubens,” “After Reynolds.” Christ is the model. But no boaster ever was, in so doing, copying Christ; his conduct was no picture “after Christ.” In 2 Corinthians 11:10 he is speaking as conformable to, and partaking of, Christ’s own truthfulness. But not the tone, or the mind, of Christ—this self-assertion and laudation.

2 Corinthians 11:19. Bitterly ironical. “Your wisdom is rather set off as by a good foil, in these fools whom you clever Corinthians can patronisingly tolerate.”

2 Corinthians 11:20. Bitterly serious. Bondage.—“Lord it over you;” and more, as in Galatians 2:4 (cf. 2 Corinthians 11:1); Acts 15:10. Taketh.—See Or “take” as in a snare; such a case, e.g., as 1 Corinthians 8:9. Smiteth.—As Paul, Acts 23:2; Christ, John 18:22; 1 Kings 22:24; perhaps as a piece of, assumed, disciplinary power. [As an Irish peasant will bear castigation from his priest, or a low-caste Hindoo a blow from a Brahmin.]

2 Corinthians 11:21. As concerning.—Same word as “after” (2 Corinthians 11:17). “I am speaking after the fashion, in the strain, of your customary ‘reproach’ (disparagement) of me, as though I acknowledged as fact,” etc. [Cf. Philippians 3:4 sqq. for a more extended parallel. “Counted loss;” and yet how, on occasion, he can bring out, and use, and find useful, for his Master’s service, his Roman citizenship, or his Jewish advantages. No “gains” to him, as a sinner needing acceptance, but great, and frequent, “gains” to the Gospel, of which he was the exponent and defender.]

2 Corinthians 11:22. Hebrews.—With a little of the implied contrast to Hellenist Jews (Acts 6:1, etc.). An old style, Conservative Jew [sprung from old style, Conservative Jews (Philippians 3:5)], born in a Greek city indeed, but keeping up the stricter ways of an orthodox Jewish house, not like Hellenists, in practice and in thought assimilating to Gentile laxity, forgetting even their Hebrew, and using a Greek translation of the Word of God. Israelites.—Cf. John 1:45. “So am I,” in a double sense. Seed of Abraham.—Cf. Galatians 3:29. “So am I,” with a new and better right also to the name, as well as that I inherited.

2 Corinthians 11:23. Fool.—As Stronger word than (say) in 2 Corinthians 11:16. Some (e.g. Beet) would press more exactly than others (e.g. Stanley), the word “more.” As if “more than these boasters.” Observe, as to “deaths” [= many occasions, and forms, of imminent peril, when life was “worth no purchase” at all, “as good as a dead man”] there is no comparison expressed. Here he is hors de concours; he has no competitor, or is beyond even apparent competition.

2 Corinthians 11:24.— Deuteronomy 25:3. Thirteen on the breast, thirteen on the right shoulder, thirteen on the left. One omitted, lest the law should be transgressed by mistake and forty exceeded. Picture Paul bound, bent, to a pillar in the synagogue; reader standing by, during the flogging, reading Deuteronomy 28:58; Deuteronomy 29:8; Psalms 78:38. The officer wielding a four-tailed whip, two thongs of calf’s skin, two of asses’ skin. (Sometimes such a scourging was fatal.) Five times such a flogging!

2 Corinthians 11:25. Rods.—Although a Roman citizen (Acts 16:22; Acts 22:24). Remember we are here only at the date of Acts 19; Acts 20. All these sufferings lie between Acts 9:19. Up to this point, the only record of imprisonment is Acts 16:24; of beating with rods of lictors—the Roman scourging (ib.); of stoning, Acts 14:19; of perils from Jews, Acts 9:23; Acts 9:29; Acts 13:50; Acts 14:5; Acts 14:19; Acts 17:5; Acts 17:13; Acts 18:12; from Gentiles (= “heathen”), Acts 16:20; Acts 19:23. May illustrate “shipwreck,” “night and a day [lit. “a night-day,” period of twenty-four hours] in deep,” by Acts 27, which is later; “perils from … countrymen,” by Acts 23:20, later also; “rivers,” by the Calycadnus, not far from Tarsus, a sudden flood in which (“a spate,” such as is common in all such short-coursed mountain streams) swept away Frederick Barbarossa; “watchings” (i.e. sleepless nights), by Acts 16:25; Acts 20:7; Acts 20:11, and (better still) by Acts 20:31; 2 Thessalonians 3:8. [Much of this well given in Stanley.]

2 Corinthians 11:28.—Notice the change of reading; and also choose between

(1) (or A.V.), and
(2) margin. See how this daily interest, a burden, and an inrushing care, led him to incessant prayers for them (Romans 1:9; Philippians 1:4; Colossians 1:3; 1 Thessalonians 1:2). [How happy Paul, how happy the Philippians! In their case, every thought for them was a prayer, every thought of them a joy.]

HOMILETIC ANALYSIS.— 2 Corinthians 11:16

Boasting Dogmatism.

I. See Paul descending to the level where his adversaries strut themselves before their admirers, boasting of their credentials and super-apostolic authority; see him snatching up their own style of weapon, and on their own ground, with their own arms, vanquishing them. Then (2 Corinthians 11:30) see him flinging away the unaccustomed weapon of parade of his doings, sufferings, services, natural advantages, and taking up a “boast” in which none of them will care to follow him,—his “infirmities.” See how this “glorying” is, as it were, wrung out of him, with many a protest to them and to his own heart that it is “folly,”and that he knows it is. Indeed, his own severest word is that such talk, such enumeration of one’s titles to honour and respect, is “not after the Lord”; it is “after the flesh.” [There is peril in it, to a man himself. In that arena, where such boasting matches come off, there is an unseen Adversary, who may find many an unguarded weakness of the soul laid open to a shaft or a thrust, whilst the Christian champion displays himself. On the morning of Trafalgar Nelson’s captains remonstrated respectfully with him against his determination on that day to put on his many orders—the tokens of his services and successes—fearing, as proved too true, that these would make him an inviting mark for the enemy’s fire.] The very “gentleman” does not willingly do it; and how much less willingly does the Christian. What society stamps as against “good form,” religion stamps as sin,—sin against the Norm and Pattern given in Christ. Social “Modesty” is, in fact, Humility severed from its Christian root-principle. [It lives for a while, as a cut flower may, in strength derived from its root in the time of their union. But only the abiding union with Christ will for any length of time keep either humility or its social analogue, modesty, a living feature of character. In fact, Paul’s phrase finds its true, deep exposition in this:] The traits in a Christian character are the traits of Christ’s character (to use of Him a word which properly belongs only to His human brethren) manifesting themselves in it. They are Christ expressing Himself in the men and women who are members of His Body. Their life, and so their words, are “in Christ.” They should, normally, only speak as He can be conceived to have spoken. A very comprehensive test of—rule for—speech! All glorification of Self, all self-centering of thought and word, is “after the flesh.” The natural heart, unchanged, unrenewed “after” the Pattern of the New Manhood, speaks thus, and betrays its presence in such self-extolling phraseology. It is “folly” before God; He knows how baseless it all is. It is “folly” before man; men “think” the boaster “a fool,” and give him no real respect; not to say that every braggart, by his implied or openly claimed superiority, wounds the self-esteem of his hearers,—the one unpardonable offence to “the flesh”! And yet, the inconsequence of things in the world! The inconsistency of the natural man! Let a man only be confident enough in himself, let him only boast boldly enough, let him only parade his credentials long enough, and the very effrontery has a strange success. They call the man “a fool”; they call themselves “fools” [to themselves; for openly they claim to show “wisdom” in their very ability to estimate such a paragon of excellence; and sometimes in their hearts also they plume themselves on the “wisdom” with which they can see through all his “boasting”!]—for submitting to such a man. But they submit; they “suffer fools finely”! Men accept truth on three grounds,—intuition, or ratiocination, or authority. For most the readiest, commonest, and (to them) most rest-giving, is Authority. All learning begins in accepting, on the authority of the teacher, some necessary basal assertions. These may afterwards be verifiable by our cultivated judgment, or sustainable by our wider knowledge. But unless there be faith in the teacher’s authority, learning is made impossible at the outset. Very many never get beyond this point. Let the Teacher only assert Authority long enough, loudly enough, he will find not a small clientèle who will become his faithful, ready disciples. It is made a reproach to Christians that they are “dogmatic”; in the same (not too accurate) sense, and with the same accidental associations attached to the word, so are many scientific teachers. It is true that, e.g., Sacerdotalism does find that its readiest way to secure acceptance with a large class of minds in a solemn, repeated, emphatic assertion of its claims. It is equally true that persistent, emphatic, widely published, influentially supported assertion is the “reason” for much popular acceptance of non-Christian or even anti-Christian unbelief. There are as many disbelievers on authority as there are believers on authority. There is great convincing power in such verbal “blows on the face” as, “Every qualified person thinks,” etc., “Nobody with the slightest pretension to judge but believes,” etc., “Professor This, Doctor That, assures us,” etc. If religious teachers descend to the arena where such methods obtain of “bringing into bondage” an obedient following, they may not complain if their opponents by the same. me methods obtain their following too. But Paul’s caustic remark remains true. Down beneath the loudest vaunt of “wisdom,” of “culture,” of “independence of thought,” there lie a deep-seated ignorance and self-distrust, which are eager for certainty, and which are only waiting for some loud enough boaster of his authority to claim and to get their eagerly given, all-enduring, very faithful, enslaved obedience (2 Corinthians 11:20).

II.

1. Hear Paul conning over his quarterings of nobility.—For the Jew had been the nobleman amongst the Gentile commoners. [As Brahmin to low-caste or no-caste man, religiously, socially, and by birth, so (in his own esteem) had been the Jew to the Gentile.] Do his adversaries of the Jewish section in the Church boast of their pure blood, “sons of Abraham”? He can show that. Or, of their place in God’s Israel? He has that. Old style, Conservative, Hebrew-speaking Jews—none of your Gentilising sort, loose in thought, too free in practice? So were he and his father before him [“a Hebrew” sprung “of Hebrews”]. If birth in a covenant people—himself wearing the seal of the covenant upon his very body from earliest infancy; if loyal pride in his people and their history; if godly, strict education in the Word and fear of God; could have availed a man anything before God or man;—Paul had them all. What Judaiser amongst them could show a fuller shield of arms than he—if a man is to found upon his quarterings of nobility? [Note how, in Philippians 3, he counted, and still counts, all these as “loss.” When it comes to be a question of finding a ground of acceptance as a sinner before God, not one of these, nor all together, is of any value as a set-off against his guilt; they may as well, they must, be written off—“loss.” He must find something else. He takes Christ, and relies wholly on Him. Yet (as in Critical Notes) as between him and men, especially for the Gospel’s sake, he can fetch out and use—what for his own sake he values at nothing—these early points of national prestige. Schiller one day opened a drawer, and carelessly tossed out to a visitor standing by a patent of nobility. “ ‘Von Schiller!’ Did you know I was a nobleman?” said he laughingly. A University man may now and again remind contemptuous opponents that he is a scholar and a gentleman; whilst ordinarily he never invites attention or remark to the point, but quietly goes on with work amongst the poor, to whom he says nothing of his college and his degrees.]

2. In such points he is the equal of the best of them. In work for Christ, and in titles to be counted a fully credentialled apostle, “a minister of Christ,” none of them is his equal. In sufferings for Christ he is alone; there is no competitor, no one to compare with him. Indeed, which of them cares to enter the lists here, and to compete for the honour of being accredited “a minister of Christ,” if these be the marks of an apostle? (2 Corinthians 11:23). What an exposition of his own phrase, “our light affliction which is but for a moment”! (2 Corinthians 4:17). If this accumulation of sufferings be “light,” what would “heavy” be! What a pre-eminence amongst the servants of Christ! To have given up what he had, and to bear all this, for the sake of a Master Whom he had barely seen—if there were “folly” in Paul, the world would so reckon this. [Yet (whether he wrote the Hebrews or not), he would have said, “Looking unto Jesus, … Who … endured the cross.” In mere physical suffering, Christ suffered less than Paul, and was never in such perils. Yet how unique are His sufferings in the Word of God. They have a solitary, unshared, unapproached significance. We feel that in studying the sufferings of Paul we are on our level, familiar ground. If in number and aggravation they are more, in kind they are the same, sufferings as other men feel. But we feel that Christ’s are on another level, and of another order.]

3. Yet such a life—this one life—has its uniqueness, in another sense. Take Stanley’s putting of the point: “It represents a life hitherto without precedent in the history of the world. Self-devotion at particular moments, if for some special national cause, had been often seen before; but a self-devotion, involving sacrifices like those here described, and extending through a period of at least fourteen years, and in behalf of no local or family interest, but for the interest of mankind at large, was, up to this time, a thing unknown. The motive of the Apostle may be explained in various ways, and the lives of missionaries and philanthropists may have equalled his in later times; but the facts here recorded remain the same. Paul did all this, and Paul was the first man who did it” (p. 562). Yet see how the very mention of all this is wrung out of the man; and with many a protest against his folly in letting himself down thus.

4. Where had Paul learned this? For “original” as such a life-lesson, a life-example, may be, quâ man and man, our mind goes back inquiring where he had caught his inspiration. He would have said in a moment, “To me to live is Christ.” The scars and manifold physical traces upon him, which these perilous and painful experiences had left, are to him matters of laudable self-gratulation. They are the “marks of the Lord Jesus” upon him (Galatians 6:17), the brand which his Master, Christ, has set upon the very body of his bondman, in token of His ownership. He almost parades them, on occasion, as a veteran may on occasion display his medal and its clasps. In quite as true a sense may we regard the whole style of such a life, its spirit, its purpose and aim,—the first so glorious an exhibition of a lifelong, often thankless and unthanked, self-devotion for the sake of others who had but scanty, or no, claim for it, as a “mark of the Lord Jesus.” Christ has set His seal, His own likeness, upon such a man. [How much of all this is lost to history! Yet the Paul known by Christ knew all these; in Christ’s “Life of Paul, My Apostle” not an item of all these would be omitted. “My times are in Thy” knowledge!]

5. And yet another mark of his Lord comes out: He is daily beset with the caring for the Churches. As is his Master, Whose words these verses, 28, 29, might well be. See what had just now come upon his sensitive spirit, in consequence of the visit of “them of Chloe’s household” (1 Corinthians 1:11). A letter which proposed sundry important questions of practical Christian ethics in which, not Corinth only, but all the Churches, in all the Christian centuries, were vitally interested,—questions which needed careful, complete reply; and still more disquieting verbal reports. These two letters catch and exhibit in permanent photography, all the acute distress of this sympathetic Paul, jealous for the honour of His Master and His Church, anxious about the souls who were his work in the Lord. Multiply such instances; add such cases as the Galatian Epistle may stand for, where his heart longs for friendship, and only finds a fickle affection which once burned hot and eager, but is now as eagerly transferring itself to others who made it their business to decry him and to undo his work (Galatians 1:6; Galatians 4:12); an Epistle where he is seen to be above all distressed at hearing of the success of teaching which seemed to him to strike at the very heart of the Gospel, and at the honour of his Christ (ib. 2 Corinthians 1:7). Referee, arbitrator, organiser, pastor, financier (chap. 8); “many coming and going,” each with something that needed swift, decisive, just direction or advice; letters to be written, friends to be guided; his work on the spot to be kept going; often in poor health; always environed with, or liable to, such experiences as in 2 Corinthians 11:23; much to try patience; more to daunt heart; often much to wound love. No wonder that he speaks of the ceaseless inrush of such cares, with their incessant onset, almost as if every new-comer were an enemy bent upon destroying his peace. [Yet this man—as witness his letters, by their example enforcing his own precept (1 Thessalonians 5:16) in the first of them—is ever rejoicing. His is a bright life. These things do not obscure or quench the sunshine of the favour of his Master, ever poured into his heart. Grace makes him a victor in, and over, all. Nay, “more than a conqueror” (Romans 8:37).] No man need envy the man in the front, or at the head, of a Church; the focus of all envy, jealousy, grumbling; the first to hear, and to feel, if anything goes wrong. [Also let this human instance be a stepping-stone to a realisation how at every moment everything reaches the Lord of the Church Himself, enthroned above it, watching, watching over, its welfare. Every daily incident, the great crisis, the trivial detail,—they are alike flashed up to Him Who sits at the Centre of Government of the Universe, where all its wires of Intelligence converge at His throne, and whence all its lines of issued Command and despatched Force radiate. What must He know, must hear, see, feel! The unfaithfulness of a Church, the break-down of a member, the battle of the Truth for very life, reaches Him; may we say, hurts Him? Of necessity seeing, knowing, all; unable to exercise the (to us merciful) power of ignoring or forgetting,—the care of all His Churches coming upon Him!]

6. And yet another mark of his Lord.—A tender sympathy for all who are wronged. [Cf. Matthew’s (“targumed”) quotation in 2 Corinthians 8:17 of Isaiah 53:4; “infirmities,” “sicknesses” put instead of “griefs,” “sorrows.” As if Christ, Who Himself only knew death, not sickness, so entered into the suffering of the crowds thronging that night around Him for healing, that He felt their pain as if it had been His own.]

(1) The “weak” are not always in the right, or deserving of unqualified sympathy and defence. Yet the minister of Christ will be ready to give the presumption in their favour, until their unworthiness be proved. He may not entertain an unreasoning, partisan sympathy with any one class [working-men, or any other]; yet if the “weak” have no other champion, they should find one in him.

(2) Nothing should more quickly set his righteous indignation “burning” than that traps should be set, and stumbling-blocks placed, in the way of a brother in Christ, into which or over which, in ignorance or weakness he falls.

(3) The man who cannot “burn” at wrong is strangely deficient in qualification for a minister of Christ. Slow to take fire [not “as the flint bears fire, Which being struck gives out a hasty spark And then grows cold again:” Brutus (of himself), Shakespeare, Julius Cæsar], but burning with sustained intensity of enkindled principle. [See how sternly Christ could feel and speak of the “offender” of even “a little one” (Matthew 18:6).]

(4) Every single soul of his flock will be so dear to a true shepherd that no greater wrong can be done to him and no greater pain given, that nothing more surely will arouse a holy indignation in him, than that its weakness or ignorance or inexperience should be taken advantage of, e.g., by a malicious worldling, or (worse) by an older, wiser, but fallen-hearted fellow-Christian. [Or even that an older Christian, by sheer, self-pleasing laxity should ruin a soul not yet established (Hebrews 12:13).]

HOMILETIC SUGGESTIONS

2 Corinthians 11:19. A Common Sequence.

I. “Wisdom,” pluming itself that it is so wise.

II. Self-conceit, which leaves the door open for—

III. Humiliating slavery to egregiously foolish touching, to obviously shallow, but very confident, loud-asserting, leaders of opinion or practice. For self-gratification how much will men endure; for, and from, Christ, how little.

2 Corinthians 11:21.

I. What sufferings.

II. What devotion.

III. What faith.

IV. What triumph.—[J. L.]

[Notice how he puts a godly ancestry and a place amongst the covenant people of God, in the very forefront. It may be an occasion of everlasting thanksgiving to a man. Or, like a noble name inherited by an unworthy scion of a great house, a shame now, and a source of everlasting shame.]