The social setting of 1 Corinthians involves a very divided
community. On this one note, all scholars agree. Exactly how that community was
divided is where scholars strongly disagree. Some see many different factions –
some even apparently “gnostic” – who are at complete odds with one another.
This picture presents a type of complete chaos. Even if we hypothesize 4
factions, if we are reasonable in our estimation of the total number of members
– a rather small group – breaking that group into four different parties would
make for a completely disorganized mass. Others, however, do not think that the
division was idealogical at all and that there might well have not been four
groups. Instead, they argue that there really were only two groups and these
groups were divided along economic lines. While the eventual solution to the
Corinthian social situation is best solved by analyzing Paul’s response as
deliberative rhetoric, comparing the social setting of the Jerusalem community
depicted in Acts frames the social division to show that it was primarily two
major groups who were neither fractured by idealogies or economics
(specifically) but instead were divided between far more reasonable lines of
(in modern Christian rhetoric) the “mature” members and the “initiates.”
First, the nature of the division needs to be analyzed.
Paul, in 1 Corinthians reports that there are divisions among the people. Paul
says that he has heard from Chloe’s people that division has arrived which he
finds abhorrent:
For it has been reported to me by
Chloe’s people that there are quarrels among you, my brothers and sisters. What
I mean is that each of you says, “I belong to Paul,” or “I belong to Apollos,”
or “I belong to Cephas,”or “I belong to Christ.” Has Christ been divided? Was
Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized into the name of Paul?[1]
This passage clearly shows that the primary social problem
he addresses is that of division. In fact, if one looks carefully at 1
Corinthians, Paul does not ethically object to many of the practices of the
Corinthians with a few slight exceptions. The issue isn’t so much what they are
doing, it is the fact that they all aren’t
doing it. He feels the need that the community be united, no matter what else
occurs.
While some have seen these four groups Paul mentions as
actual political factions, it makes far better sense that they are not. First,
he does not bring up any of these factions again – as if they were truly
organized. Second, he has no problem with any seeming leader. Third, the use of
four groups was a necessity in ancient deliberative rhetoric to create homonoia (“concord”) as Margaret
Mitchell has clearly shown.[2]
Therefore, it seems far less likely that there were 4 actual groups. It is far
more likely that this division into 4 is simply a rhetorical device.
Secondly, the different groups are very unlikely different
due to ideology. As one reads Corinthians carefully, there is very little to
suggest there were true theological differences and disagreements among
members. L.L. Welborn has made this point clearly:
It is no longer necessary to argue
against the position that the conflict which evoked 1 Corinthians 1-4 was
essentially theological in character. The attempt to identify the parties with
the views and practices condemned elsewhere in the epistle, as if the parties
represented different positions in a dogmatic controversy, has collapsed under
its own weight. Johannes Weiss already saw the flaw in this approach: Paul’s
strategy in dealing with the parties makes it impossible to differentiate
between them…No one doubts that doctrinal differences existed, or that the
claim to possess divine wisdom and knowledge played an important role in the
controversy. But many, if not most, scholars today have returned to the view of
John Calvin: that the real problem being addressed in 1 Corinthians 1-4 is one
of partisanship.[3]
If the problem is not particularly ideological, then the
problem that caused the division must be primarily social. Gerd Theissen has
pointed this out, as summarized succinctly by Wayne Meeks:
The conflicts in the congregation
are in large part conflicts between people of different strata and, within
individuals, between the expectations of a hierarchical society and those of an
egalitarian community.[4]
The argument is then that the issue is primarily of status rather than anything else. This
does seem, at some level to hold water – particularly in the passage on the
Lord’s supper in 1 Cor. 11 wherein it seems quite clear that there are some
groups who are held in higher esteem than others.
Dale Martin has shown that the divisions that Paul
continually addresses in a variety of names probably only reflect one major
division into two groups – the elect and the initiates. Martin argues that the
rhetoric of the “strong” and “weak” is the governing term that then dominates
the remainder of the discussion of the terms Paul uses to condemn the group
(powerful, arrogant, kings, rich, wise, knowledgeable, etc.):
As Margaret Mitchell has recently
noted, however, this way of talking about stasis,
or factiousness, was common in rhetoric on concord, and we need not assume that
Paul is really thinking of four actual groups in Corinth. In fact, as many
other scholars have pointed out, when Paul finally gets down to addressing
specific issues, he simplifies the situation to a division between two groups,
one that seems to hold – or at least aspire to – high status and another that
does not. As I argued above in the section on homonoia rhetoric, speeches on concord often simply political
conflict to one between “rich” and “poor,” possibly using other terms such as
“strong” and “weak”, terms which, in any case, refer to groups higher and lower
respectively in a hierarchical dichotomy.[5]
Here, one should note carefully the language Paul uses as
primarily sarcastic – he insults those who are “strong” by accusing them of all
kinds of things they should be ashamed to hold.
In further support of Martin’s point, consider the actual
points of contention that Paul addresses: sexuality, food sacrificed to idols,
spiritual gifts, the Lord’s supper. In each of these, Paul does not find these
things wrong, merely that they are not necessary. For example, there are some
who have withheld completely from all sexuality and believe that for a member
of the Jesus movement, a true member should not partake of any sexual behavior.[6]
If one reads between the lines, it is clear that some people have been “truly devoted” and renounced sexuality
whereas the other “lesser” Christians have not been able to do so. Further, if
one looks at the issue of food sacrificed to idols, Paul’s argument is that
those in the community who have true knowledge and truly understand can eat of
it, but not those who do not – clearly showing that some people were “capable
of handing it” and others were not. Finally, the issue of spiritual gifts shows
that only some members were able to
perform them while others had not yet developed to that point. In all of these
cases, an implicit hierarchy is clearly being presented – there are the mature
or elite members who are taking this religion seriously whereas others are
merely initiates and are not yet able to handle such things. All of this suggests
two major groups differentiated more by status into a hierarchy.
Dale Martin argues that this hierarchy was differentiated
along economic lines. While I agree that there was a clear hierarchy present
which Paul condemns (though he does not actually condemn the hierarchy – he
simply condemns how it was being managed), I am not convinced that it was
primarily an issue of economics. Martin argues that the Lord’s Supper scene
suggests clear discussion of economic hierarchy – there were some who could afford
it, came early (perhaps because they did not have jobs), brought food and those
who had nothing, came late after work, and ate nothing due to poverty. While this could be in some way true,
it could also easily be a differentiated time by invitation – those who came
early could be a set group of the “truly devoted” followers and only later
would the initiates be invited. I am not suggesting that social status in
society would have no role in the
community, but I am not convinced that economics alone were the primary issue. As Meeks has pointed out, social
status is multifaceted and we should avoid anything that thinks of it
monolithically (such as economics):
In recent years, however, most
sociologists have come to see social stratification as a multidimensional
phenomenon; to describe the social level of an individual or group, one must
attempt to measure their rank along each of
the relevant dimensions. For example, one might discover that, in a given
society, the following variables affect how an individual is ranked: power
(defined as “the capacity for achieving goals in social systems”), occupational
prestige, income or wealth, education and knowledge, religious and ritual
purity, family and ethnic-group position, and local-community status (evaluation
within some subgroup, independent of the larger society but perhaps interacting
with it). It would be a rare individual who occupied exactly the same rank, in
either his own view or that of others, in terms of all these factors.[7]
Not only would economics not necessarily be the most
important factor, it would not necessarily be the only one valued in the
community.
Here, the analogue of the book of Acts is very helpful.
There is no evidence that the community in 1 Corinthians knew the community in
Jerusalem, but the fact that they were contemporaneous suggests that it was
certainly possible that these models could have been known. Indeed, we know
that the community in Corinth was in
contact with other Jesus-movement communities. For example, note Paul’s direction
concerning the collection: “Now concerning the collection for the saints: you
should follow the directions I gave to the churches of Galatia.”[8]
The community in Corinth apparently knows the directions Paul gave to Galatia.
Either they have seen transcripts of letters (though it is hard to believe that
they would have gotten this detail from the book of Galatians), or they are
aware of the community and are in some kind of dialogue themselves. Further, we
know there were many traveling missionaries who visited various places –
sometimes to Paul’s chagrin as in 2 Cor. 10-13 and Galatians. Therefore, it is
not absurd to use the model of ekklesia in
Jerusalem as a corollary that might be a helpful heuristic tool to understand the
community in 1 Corinthians. After all, it is not necessary that they were in
correspondence with the Jerusalem church – it is only necessary in social
network theory – that they had heard of them from a source they found reliable
(in this case quite ironically it could have been from Paul himself).
The Jerusalem community seems to have held quite clearly two
classes of members. Some who were merely attending and joined the Jesus
movement with baptism (such as we should expect as how they treated Paul in
Acts 9) and others who truly joined the community who did so in a ritual of
laying their possessions at the feet of the apostles and living in common with
them. On this particular ritual see my previous blog post "Holding
All Things in Common: The Curious Case of Ananias and Saphira." This
post was developed from the interesting argument of Brian Capper who argued
that there was clearly a formal group in Jerusalem which one entered by giving
all one had (and even this – he argues – was provisional for the period an
initiate would need to be fully devoted).[9]
Regardless if one accepts Capper’s argument that there was a time of the
initiate similar to the Qumran community, it is clearly present that before
Ananias and Saphira had (failed to) donate their sale of their property to the
community so they could all live in common, they were part of the community. It
was only a requirement for those who wanted to join the more elite group that
went through this practice.
Therefore, Acts suggests there was a clearly divided status
between the initiates and the mature Christians. It should be noted that Acts
tries to whitewash this, but it is the only reasonable argument for
understanding Acts 1-6. What this should teach us about 1 Corinthians, though,
is not that anyone in 1 Corinthians
was holding all things in common. Rather, what should be noted is the way that
status was apportioned. It was not apportioned to the elect outside of the ekklesia. The
economically wealthy, the politically powerful, or the ones with the most
guest-friend connections were not the members of this elite group. Rather,
those people would probably have been the last people to join given that they
would have had more to lose than the poor. The way one became part of this
elite group was through a ritual within
the ekklesia. It is far easier to understand the community at Corinth’s
hierarchy if it was based less on politico-economic standing and more upon
those who were more functional in the church itself.
This argument has the virtue of helping us understand 1
Corinthians more carefully. The people who were the elite were not those who
necessarily were influential outside the ekklesia
– they were people who were essential inside
the ekklesia. When Paul calls these people “wise” or “knowledgeable,” he
does not suggest they are so in philosophy – instead, we are led to assume they
are so gifted in regard to the worship of God. They are the ones more
knowledgeable than others in the very running of the ekklesia itself. While
this might well have included some people who were also influential outside the
community, there is no reason we need to suggest such a thing. It makes far
more sense that there was a hierarchy that was based on a variety of things
based upon people’s practical roles and functions within the church.
The use of the Jerusalem community to understand 1
Corinthians is a method I use cautiously. As mentioned above, there is not good
evidence that there was clear communication between these groups. However, I am
not arguing here for a true dependence – merely that such a model would not
have been unheard of for the Corinthian community. Further, it is fair to argue
that this model is one that makes good sense – those who have been in the
community longer and are more knowledgeable would logically be at the top
rather than the bottom of a hierarchy. It is this model that Paul argues needs
to be aggressively changed.
[1] 1 Cor.
1:11-13 (NRSV).
[2] Margaret M.
Mitchell Paul and the Rhetoric of
Reconciliation: An Exegetical Investigation of the Language and Composition of
1 Corinthians (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1991).
[3] L.L. Welborn
“On the Discord in Corinth: 1 Corinthians 1-4 and Ancient Politics” JBL 106 (1987): 88-89.
[4] Wayne A.
Meeks The First Urban Christians: The
Social World of the Apostle Paul (New Haven and London: Yale University
Press, 1983), 53.
[5] Dale B.
Martin The Corinthian Body (New Haven
and London: Yale University Press, 1995), 58.
[6] 1 Cor. 7:1.
[7] Meeks, The First Urban Christians, 54.
[8] 1 Cor. 16:1.
[9] Brian
Capper, “Interpretation of Acts 5.4” JSNT
19 (1983) 117-131.
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