1 Corinthians 7:39

39. [νόμῳ] rec. with EFG, Peshito and authorized Vulg., after δέδεται. Omit אABD, and some copies of Vetus Lat. and Vulg. It is no doubt a marginal gloss. Tertullian and Origen omit it.

39. γυνὴ δέδεται. The perfect marks the permanent nature of the marriage contract. See Romans 7:2.

ἐὰν δὲ κοιμηθῇ ὁ�. Literally, if her husband sleep, or rather, perhaps, be laid to sleep, the word generally used of the death of Christians, of the saints of the old covenant and even of the heathen. The phrase is as old as Homer. See Il. XI. 241, and Soph. Electr. 509 ὁ ποντισθεὶς Μυρτίλος ἐκοιμάθη. Cf. Matthew 27:52; John 11:11; Acts 7:60; Acts 13:36. St Paul uses it in ch. 1 Corinthians 11:30 and ch. 1 Corinthians 15:6; 1 Corinthians 15:18; 1 Corinthians 15:20; 1 Corinthians 15:51, and in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-15. The writers of the Old Testament also described death thus, as, for instance, in Deuteronomy 31:16; 1 Kings 2:10; Daniel 12:2. Thus death is robbed of half its terrors. It is a condition of partially, not wholly, suspended consciousness; a waiting of the soul, in union with its Lord until the great awakening. Calvin remarks that to infer from this passage that the soul, separated from the body, was without sense or intelligence, would be to say that it was without life. See 2 Corinthians 12:2. The aorist here, as in ἀπέθανον, refers not only to the past act, but to the present condition.

μόνον ἐν κυρίῳ. Cf. 2 Corinthians 6:14. The marriage of widows was discountenanced, but not forbidden. Under certain circumstances it was even enjoined. See 1 Timothy 5:9; 1 Timothy 5:11; 1 Timothy 5:14. But under all circumstances mixed marriages were to be avoided.