Today’s first reading from St. Paul is part of a cohesive thought that he has been building upon since the beginning of this 1st Letter to the Corinthians (which began with Friday’s readings and continues for about three weeks.) It all began after Paul left the Corinth community for new evangelizing opportunities. He received a letter from a believer named Chloe who reports problems in the community: there is quarreling in the community all carried on in the name of “wisdom” and some associated boasting about who possessed wisdom and the exact nature of the wisdom. We are picking up the conversation-in-progress, but let me offer that the major points St. Paul has already made are:
Are you choosing the Wisdom of men or the Wisdom of the Cross (1:18–2:5)? St. Paul makes it clear that the Cross is not something to which one may add human wisdom and thereby make it superior; rather, the cross stands in absolute, uncompromising contradiction to human wisdom. Key points he makes along the way to our reading
- God’s folly: a crucified Messiah (1:18–25) – here he argues, with OT support, that what God had always intended and had foretold in the prophets, he has now accomplished through the crucifixion: He has brought an end to human self-sufficiency.
- God’s folly: the Corinthian believers (1:26–31) – To further his argument that the gospel he preached stands in direct contradiction to human expectations about God, Paul turns from the content of the gospel to the existence of the Corinthians themselves as believers. Not from the world’s “beautiful people,” but from the lower classes, the “nobodies,” God chose those who for the most part would make up his new people. Thus they themselves evidence the foolishness of God that confounds the wise.
- God’s folly: Paul’s preaching (2:1–5) – It is not just the folly of a crucified Savior, or choosing the Corinthian “nobodies,” but God chose to use Paul, an evangelist who lack the sophisticated debating skills with which people are enamored. Thus, not only the means (the cross) and the people (the church in Corinth), but also the preacher (Paul) declare that God is in the process of overturning the world’s systems
… which brings us to the first reading today
- God’s Wisdom—Revealed by the Spirit (2:6–16)
To this point Paul has been rather hard on “wisdom” because there is a prevailing Corinthian attitude that has placed him and his gospel in a less than favorable light. Rather Paul holds up God’s wisdom and that Christ has become “wisdom” for us – but it is only encountered in the foolishness of the Cross. And it cannot be perceived by those only interested in pursuing human wisdom. Rather, it is recognized only by those who have the Spirit.
Where is that found? The verse just before our reading makes it clear: “What eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and what has not entered the human heart, what God has prepared for those who love him. This God has revealed to us through the Spirit” (1 Cor 2:9-10a)
The key to understanding God’s wisdom lies with the Spirit. The basis of the argument that follows is the Greek philosophical principle of “like is known only by like,” that is, humans do not on their own possess the quality that would make it possible to know God or God’s wisdom. Only “like is known by like”; only God can know God. Therefore, the Spirit of God becomes the link between God and humanity, the “quality” from God himself who makes the knowing possible.
The argument began with the assertion that Paul does indeed speak wisdom among the “grown-ups” of God’s people. That wisdom, which is not esoteric knowledge of deeper truths about God but simply his own plan for saving his people, is contrasted to that of the leaders of the present age, who cannot know God’s wisdom because it is his “secret, hidden” wisdom, destined for, and finally revealed to, those who love him. That revelation has been given by the Spirit, who alone knows the inner secrets of God, and whom, as this verse now affirms, “we have received.”
In tomorrow’s first reading Paul will continue this train of thought, introducing speaking wisdom among the “infants” of God’s people.
Image credit: Saint Paul Writing His Epistles |attributed to Valentin de Boulogne | Houston Museum of Fine Arts| PD-US
Source: Gordon Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1987) part of The New International Commentary on the New Testament series.