1 Corinthians 10:19-20

“What say I then? that the meat offered to the idol is anything? Or that an idol is anything?...20. But the things which they sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, and not to God. Now I would not that ye should be in communion with demons.”

The way in which Paul had just cited the two previous examples evidently assumed that he ascribed a diabolical influence to the sacrificial feasts of the heathen; now this idea seemed to be in contradiction to chap. 1 Corinthians 8:4; 1 Corinthians 8:6, where it had been declared that the gods of the heathen are not real divinities, and that the meat offered on their altar is consequently neither more nor less than simple meat, like any other. Paul therefore anticipates the objection which he foresees: “Art thou not now, contrary to thy previous declarations, allowing a disturbing influence to meats devoted to idols, and consequently, a Divine reality to the idols themselves?” In the order of questions, I follow the reading of the Vatic. and the Cantabrig., for it seems to me logical that Paul should begin with the question relating to the meat offered, to ascend therefrom to the question relating to the idol. I admit, however, that the opposite order may also be justified.

The omission of the question relating to the idol in the Sinaït., etc., is one of those many lacunae, especially in this MS., which are caused by the recurrence of the same letters at the distance of a few words. In the first question: That the meat offered to the idol is anything? the word anything signifies anything exceptional, having power to exercise a particular influence. In the second question: That an idol is anything? the anything signifies anything real. Sometimes the word τί has been taken as an adjective: “That any idol whatever is, that is to say exists” (εἴδωλόν τι ἔστιν, instead of εἴδωλόν τί ἐστιν). But the τί would be superfluous in this sense. It is more natural to take it as the predicate in the two questions.

Vv. 20. The apostle does not even take the trouble of stating the negative answer which he gives to these two questions; he passes directly to the affirmation which concerns him: Jupiter, Apollo, Venus, certainly, are not real beings; but Satan is something. Behind all that mythological phantasmagoria there lie concealed malignant powers, which, without being divinities, are nevertheless very real, and very active, and which have succeeded in fascinating the human imagination, and in turning aside the religious sentiment of the heathen nations to beings of the fancy; hence the idolatrous worships, worships addressed to those diabolical powers and not to God.

The subst. τὰ ἔθνη, the Gentiles, is omitted by the Vatic. and the Greco-Lats.; it is certainly an explanatory addition. This neuter substantive, once introduced, dragged into the T. R. the singular θύει, instead of the plural θύουσιν.

The subject of this latter verb is understood; it is self-evident.

The term δαιμόνιον, demon, which occurs nowhere else in Paul's writings except in 1 Timothy 4:1, has quite another meaning in the New Testament than in the classics. In the latter it is synonymous with θεῖον, something Divine. Plato in the Symposium, says that “demon is something intermediate between God and mortals;” and, in another passage: “That the demons interpret to the gods the things of men, and to men the things of the gods.” Imported into biblical language by the version of the LXX., the word there denotes the fallen angels, so often spoken of in Scripture. Thus Deuteronomy 32:17, the LXX. translate the words: jizebekou laschschédim..., ἔθυσαν δαιμονίοις καὶ οὐ θεῷ (sched probably denoting in Hebrew idols, from schad, to rule). The Jews identified heathen divinities with the demons themselves; thus it is that the LXX. translate in Isaiah 65:11, the phrase: “to prepare a table for the host of heaven,” by: “to prepare a table for the demon.” The pagan Plutarch (De defectu orac., chap. 13) ascribes to wicked spirits all that was barbarous and cruel, for example, human sacrifices in heathen religions. We may compare also Psalms 96:5: “For all the gods of the heathen are demons” (in Hebrew idols), and Baruch, chap. 4: “They sacrifice to demons, not to God.” It is in this Jewish acceptation that the term is used here. But the words of the apostle do not imply the idea that every false god worshipped by the heathen corresponds to a particular demon; they signify merely that heathen religions emanate from those malignant spirits, and that consequently the man who takes part in such worship puts himself under their influence. “How was it possible,” says Heinrici, “to sit at such a feast, to be sprinkled with the holy water, to obey the prescription of sacred silence, to take part in the joy of the hymns and dances which filled the interval between the sacrifice and the banquet, and finally to be given up to the joy of the feast which crowned the festive day to the glory of the false god, without acting as a worshipper of the heathen divinity?” The diabolical character of idolatry could be masked to a certain extent in Greek heathenism by the charm or majesty of the forms; but is it not clearly unveiled in modern heathen religions, particularly in Hindoo and African forms of worship, in which God's holy image has come at last to give place completely to hideous and ignoble figures? Besides, the inspiring sentiment of these worships is solely that of fear.

The δέ is progressive: “ Now I would not.” This authoritative form is accounted for by the solicitude of love. A father cannot allow his children to deliver themselves into bad hands.