Expositor's Greek Testament (Nicoll)

1 Corinthians 8:10

enforces (γάρ) the above warning. σὲ τὸν ἔχοντα γνῶσιν “thee, the man that has knowledge” (see 1): the Cor [1262] pretension to superior enlightenment, shown in 1 Corinthians 8:2 f. to be faulty in Christian theory, now discloses its practical mischief. The behaviour of the Christian man of knowledge who “reclines (at table) in an idol's temple,” is represented as a sort of bravado a thing done to show his “knowledge,” his complete freedom from superstition about the idol. This act is censured because of its effect upon the mind of others; in 1 Corinthians 10:18-22 it will be condemned on its own account. The form εἰδωλίον (or - εῖον) occurs in the Apocrypha; it follows the formation of Gr [1263] temple names Ἀπολλωνεῖον, etc. οὐχὶ ἡ συνείδησις αὐτοῦ, ἀσθενοῦς ὄντος κ. τ. λ.; “will not his conscience, weak as he is, be ‘edified' unto eating the foods offered to idols?” not because he is weak (as though overpowered by a stronger mind), but while he is still weak, as under the lingering belief that the idol is “something in the world” (1 Corinthians 8:7): “his verbis exprimitur horror infirmi, tamen edentis” (Bg [1264]). Thus eating unpersuaded “in his own mind” (Romans 14:5), he sins (Romans 14:23), and therefore “is perishing” (1 Corinthians 8:11). The vb [1265] “edified” instead of “persuaded” or the like is used in sad irony (cf. Tert [1266], “ædificatur ad ruinam,” De Prœscr. Hœretic., 3); P. probably takes up the word in this connexion from the Church Letter: the eaters of idolothyta thought their practice “edifying” to less advanced brethren “ edifying, forsooth! to what end?”

[1262] Corinth, Corinthian or Corinthians.

[1263] Greek, or Grotius' Annotationes in N.T.

[1264] Bengel's Gnomon Novi Testamenti.

[1265] verb

[1266]ert. Tertullian.

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Expositor's Greek Testament (Nicoll)

1 Corinthians 8:10

Old Testament

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