ἀδελφῷ. אABCDEFG, Vetus Lat. ἀνδρί rec. with Peshito and Vulg. Irenaeus however (Lat. vers.) and Tertullian support the rec. They may, however, have been quoting loosely. The word ἀνδρί would naturally occur to the mind of a copyist, while it is difficult to understand the introduction of ἀδελφῷ.

14. ἡγίασται. Hath been sanctified, i.e. by the union of the unbeliever with the believer. The sacred character imparted by Christianity has, since it imparts union with Christ the Lord of all, a power to overcome the unregenerate condition of the non-Christian partner in wedlock. Meyer’s note is very striking here. He says that ‘the Christian sanctity affects even the non-believing partner in a marriage and so passes over to him that he does not remain a profane person, but through the intimate union of wedded life becomes partaker (as if by a sacred contagion) of the higher divinely consecrated character of his consort.’ And this is because matrimony is ‘a holy estate instituted of God.’ For the much stricter view under the Law, Dean Stanley refers to Ezra, ch. 9, and Nehemiah 3:2; Nehemiah 13:23-28. But these marriages were contracted in defiance of the prohibition in Exodus 34:16; Deuteronomy 7:3-4, a prohibition rendered necessary by the surrounding idolatry and its attendant licentiousness. They stand upon a different footing to marriages contracted before admission into covenant with God. Observe that when in the right path, holiness is a stronger force than evil. But (see 1 Corinthians 6:15) when once we overstep its bounds, evil is more powerful than good.

ἐν τῇ γυναικί. ‘By virtue of his union with the (believing) wife.’ Cf. Soph. Aj. 519 ἐν σοὶ πᾶσ' ἔγωγε σώζομαι i.e. by virtue of my union with thee am I kept altogether free from harm.

ἐπεὶ ἄρα … ἐστιν. Since in the opposite case your children are unclean, the indicative marking more strongly the natural result of a supposition contrary to that of the Apostle than the subjunctive rendering of the A. and R.V.

νῦν δὲ ἅγιά ἐστιν. This principle applies also to the children of such a marriage. The sanctity, i.e. the consecration, of the parent possessing the life of Christ, and living in holy wedlock with an unbelieving husband or wife, descends to the child, which from its birth may be regarded as ‘holy to the Lord.’ ‘Which we may not so understand as if the children of baptized parents were without sin, or grace from baptized parents derived by propagation, or God by covenant and promise tied to save any in mere regard of their parents’ belief: yet to all professors of the name of Christ this pre-eminence above infidels is freely given, that the fruit of their bodies bringeth into the world with it a present interest and right to those means wherewith the ordinance of Christ is that His Church shall be sanctified.’ Hooker, Ecclesiastical Polity, Book v. lx. 6. This holds good, however, only of such marriages as were contracted before conversion. Christians were forbidden in 1 Corinthians 7:39 and in 2 Corinthians 6:14, to contract marriages with the heathen.

Continues after advertising
Continues after advertising

Old Testament