1 Corinthians 4:13

we are made as the filth of the world The word here translated filthmeans (1) that which is removed by cleansingand (2) an expiatory sacrifice, one who is delivered up to destruction, like Jonah, to save others as guilty as himself. St Paul does not assert that he issuch a sacrifice, but that he is likeone, because by his sorrows and sufferings many souls are brought to Christ. Cf. Colossians 1:24, and Bp Wordsworth in loc.

and are the offscouring Literally, as the offscouring. This word in the original is derived from a verb signifying to rub, scrape, shave. It has similar significations to the preceding: (1) that which is removed by rubbing, (2) a sacrifice for the benefit of others. Suidas in his Lexicon states that it was a custom among the Greeks in times of calamity to cast a victim into the sea as a sacrifice to appease Poseidon, the god of the sea, with the words, "Be thou our offscouring." In virtue of the humiliations and distresses endured by St Paul, he represents himself as becoming the refuse of mankind, in order that by this means he may bring blessings innumerable within their reach. So Tob 5:18, "Let the money be sacrificed as noughtfor the sake of the child;" and Ignatius (to the Ephesians, ch. 8), "I am your offscouring," i.e. I am undergoing these afflictions for your sakes, and similarly in the Epistle attributed to St Barnabas (ch. 6), in all which places the same word is used.

of all things Better, of all men.