1 Corinthians 6:9-10

“Or know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, 10. nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God.”

The particle ἤ, or, signifies, as it usually does in this formula: “Or, if you think you can act thus without danger....” The Corinthians seemed to imagine that their religious knowledge and Christian talk would suffice to open heaven to them, whatever their conduct otherwise might be. But how do they fail to understand that by falling back into sin, from which faith had rescued them, they themselves destroy the effect of their transition from heathenism to the gospel?

The unrighteous are placed first and separately named; for righteousness is the matter now in question (1 Corinthians 6:8).

The notion of the kingdom of God is here taken in the eschatological sense, that is to say, from the standpoint of the final consummation of this Divine state of things; and the verb κληρονομεῖν, to inherit, is an allusion to the inheritance of Canaan given to Israel as a type of the blessedness to come.

The μὴ πλανᾶσθε, do not deceive yourselves, shows clearly that seductive arguments were in circulation by which the vicious succeeded in quieting their consciences.

The warning is generalized, as in chap. 1 Corinthians 5:9-11. The first five terms in the following enumeration relate more or less directly to the vice of impurity; the following five to the spoliation of another's goods.

Idolatry was closely connected with licentiousness in morals (see on chap. 1 Corinthians 5:11).

The effeminate, μαλακοί, are either those who give themselves up to some unnatural vice, or all in general who pamper their body; abusers of themselves, ἀρσενοκοῖται, are those who give themselves over to monstrous vices (Romans 1:27). There is in the latter term the idea of activity; in μαλακοί rather that of passivity.

Vv. 10. The apostle closes the enumeration with ἅρπαγες, extortioners; this last term leads back to the principal subject of the whole passage, the ἀδίκειν and the ἀποστερεῖν. In one of the last terms, for οὔτε, nor, the apostle substitutes οὐ, not, as if the feeling of repulsion rose in him with the accumulation of terms: “No, in spite of all your reasonings, it will be of no avail! The drunkard shall not enter...”

The kingdom of God is a holy state of things, it receives none but sanctified members.