Here is part two of our study on holiness. This is taken from 1 Corinthians. For part one, please go here for the introduction and holiness as found in Paul’s letter to the Romans.
Unless noted otherwise, all passages are presented from the NIV11 text. There are a few times when my translation will be used for clarity.
Analysis
ἅγιος: 1. as adjective pertaining to being dedicated or consecrated to the service of God
- in the cultic sense dedicated to God, holy, sacred, i.e. reserved for God and God’s service:
ἁγιασμός: personal dedication to the interests of the deity, holiness, consecration, sanctification. Kittle: sanctifying, i.e. a process.
ἁγιωσύνη: Holiness. Kittle: “This rare word, formed from the adjective ἅγιος by extension of the o to ω after a short syllable as an abstract term of quality, in the same way as δικαιοσύνη is formed from δίκαιος, is not found in pre-biblical Greek. It means ‘sanctification’ or ‘holiness’ rather than ‘sanctifying’, but as a quality rather than a state.”
ἁγιάζω: 1. set aside something or make it suitable for ritual purposes, consecrate, dedicate of things. 2. include a person in the inner circle of what is holy, in both cultic and moral associations of the word, consecrate, dedicate, sanctify. 3. to treat as holy, reverence. 4. to eliminate that which is incompatible with holiness, purify
Passages where Paul calls the Corinthians “holy ones”.
1Corinthians 1:2 To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people ἁγίοις, together with all those everywhere who call on the named of our Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours:
1Corinthians 6:1 If any of you has a dispute with another, do you dare to take it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the Lord’s people ἁγίων? 2 Or do you not know that the Lord’s people ἅγιοι will judge the world? And if you are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases? 3 Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more the things of this life!
1Corinthians 14:33 For God is not a God of disorder but of peace—as in all the congregations of the Lord’s people ἁγίων.
1Corinthians 16:1 Now about the collection for the Lord’s people ἁγίους: Do what I told the Galatian churches to do.
1Corinthians 16:15 You know that the household of Stephanas were the first converts in Achaia, and they have devoted themselves to the serviced of the Lord’s people ἁγίοις.
Holy Kiss:
1Corinthians 16:20 All the brothers and sisters here send you greetings. Greet one another with a holy ἁγίῳ kiss.
Passages on the Holy Spirit:
1Corinthians 6:19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy ἁγίου Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;
1Corinthians 12:3 Therefore I want you to know that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, “Jesus be cursed,” and no one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy ἁγίῳ Spirit.
Holiness Passages:
1Corinthians 1:1 Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes, 2 To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified ἡγιασμένοις in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people ἁγίοις, together with all those everywhere who call on the named of our Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours: 3 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The participle, ἡγιασμένοις, is in the perfect tense. It could be translated as “to those who have been made holy in Christ Jesus”. What will be obvious as we go through the letter is that Paul means this to be the initial “setting apart” of being God’s people. For we will find that the Corinthians are far from being “blameless” or “holy” as far as the process is concerned. Nevertheless, Paul does say that the Corinthians have been made holy in Jesus who has called them to be holy.
1Corinthians 1:26 Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28 God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, 29 so that no one may boast before him. 30 It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness ἁγιασμὸς and redemption. 31 Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.”
Up onto this point, Paul has been reprimanding the Corinthians for putting some leaders above others, thus dividing the congregation. Paul goes into that the wisdom and knowledge of the people of the world is foolishness to God. God uses not so knowledgable people so that he power can show through and put the “wise world” to shame.
Christ has become for the Corinthians wisdom from God which is “righteousness, holiness, and redemption”. In other words, the wisdom that matters is wisdom about Jesus and the Gospel and how that saves them.
Paul makes it clear that it is the Holy Spirit in a person that allows them to know the mind of God. The Corinthians have the Spirit so that they can know what God has given to them. But, since they are putting some leaders above other leaders, and some apostles over other apostles, Paul says that they are letting the spirit of the world influence them.
1Corinthians 6:7 The very fact that you have lawsuits among you means you have been completely defeated already. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? 8 Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers and sisters. 9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified ἡγιάσθητε, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
12 “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but I will not be mastered by anything. 13 You say, “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy them both.” The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. 14 By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. 15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never! 16 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.” 17 But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit.
1Corinthians 6:18 Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body. 19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy ἁγίου Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.
Up unto this point, Paul has dealt with the congregation over putting up with one of them having a sexual relationship with his own mother (his father’s wife) and the fact that some of the Corinthians were proud of it! Apparently, some of the Corinthians thought that “they had arrived” in such knowledge that what they do in the body is nothing because they have the Holy Spirit. Paul goes on to tell them to not associate with such people at all. For Paul says that people who do this, will influence the rest of the congregation (5:6 Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are). Paul will touch on sexual immorally a little later.
From there, he goes into how members of the congregation were filing lawsuits against each other. He uses this example to show the Corinthians that they are not being led by the Spirit at all as they are putting their trusts in pagan courts rather than their own spirit-filled people. Greater than this, the division among the congregation over this has the whole congregation “defeated” as they are wronging each other and treating each other badly. Even if the plaintiff wins, because of his actions, he really loses and the entire congregation loses as the outside world can see how “the true God’s people” really are. Paul then takes a drastic turn, he puts this sort of thing within the realm of other sins where one can’t inherit the Kingdom of God (be saved) by doing them.
Paul tells them that some of them used to do these terrible sins, but they were “washed clean” (ἀπολούω = to wash something away. In this case, what has been washed away are the sins that Paul has just mentioned). They have also been “made holy” and “made righteous” by their conversion and the Holy Spirit’s refining process, of which, the latter is most certainly needed and only the Corinthians are standing in the way of it.
Paul then moves back into sexual immorality and how sexual sins affect the person’s body which is the temple of the Holy Spirit. What is important here is that Paul is questioning the Corinthians’ theology around “living in the Spirit”. Apparently, some thought that while a person has God’s Spirit, one could do anything with his/her body because would be destroyed in the end and the Spirit of a person was what counted. They were taking “liberty in the Spirit” to the extreme. Therefore, they could not say “I have the right to do anything”.
Πορνεία (sexual immorality) in the NT mostly deals with engaging with a prostitute, but as indicated in Chapter 5, it means here “to engage in a sexual relationship with someone other than one’s spouse”. Engaging in sexual sin, defiles the temple (one’s body) of God. The impact of such defilement suggests that the Holy Spirit can’t be housed in a defiled temple. We will soon find out why there was sexual immorality going on.
1Corinthians 7:12 To the rest I say this (I, not the Lord): If any brother has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to live with him, he must not divorce her. 13 And if a woman has a husband who is not a believer and he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him. 14 For the unbelieving husband has been sanctified ἡγίασται through his wife, and the unbelieving wife has been sanctified ἡγίασται through her believing husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy ἅγιά.
15 But if the unbeliever leaves, let it be so. The brother or the sister is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to live in peace. 16 How do you know, wife, whether you will save your husband? Or, how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?
To say that this is a controversial passage doesn’t come close to reality. Up unto this point, Paul has been discussing some of the Corinthians’ questions. In this case, some of them, perhaps some of the women, had said “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.” (7:1). Paul agrees with this statement to an extent, but goes on to say that since sexual immorality was going on, then married people should not deprived themselves of each other because that just leads to sexual immorality. Paul also covers what is expected of the unmarried and widows/widowers (7:8-11).
Paul then moves into our passage. It is most likely his command and not Jesus’ command as there is not account of Jesus ever teaching on this subject of a marriage that involved a believing person and a non-believing person. Apparently, some of the Corinthians had thought that a believer would be defiled by having sexual relations with their unbelieving spouse. Thus we come to Paul’s correction. His argument is that in a marriage, the sexual union between a believer and a non-believer doesn’t defile the believer. In fact, the unbeliever in made holy in the union so that there is no defilement. Paul goes on to strengthen his argument by saying that “otherwise your children would be unclean” as a result of being produced in a marriage of a believer and an unbeliever. He says that’s not true, because the children are holy.
To be clear, this has nothing to do with salvation as Paul makes that very clear in verse 16. He also allows for the two to separate in such a union, but only if the unbeliever does so.
Inferred Holiness Passages?
It may can be stated that all of Paul’s corrections infer holiness brought on by the Holy Spirit, especially the ones that deal with the Corinthians’ theology. This is certainly true with Chapters 12-14 on Spiritual Things and in Chapter 15 of the Resurrection.
Paul’s correction of women removing their veils or hoods (From verse 15; περιβόλαιον: “an article of apparel that covers much of the body, covering, wrap, cloak, robe; BDAG, page 800) in public worship could possible fall under “inferred holiness” as they were appealing to their liberty in the Spirit to do so. The problem with this of course is that Paul seems to agree with the women that they do have the authority to remove their veils/hoods, but argues against them doing it based on the order of creation and culture. They are to maintain the distinction between the sexes, but it must be stated that Paul doesn’t say “The Lord commands” nor “I command” as he does in other passages where correction is front and center.
Final Thoughts:
As in Romans, holiness is not something that a person can acquirer on his/her own. It is God who makes one holy through the Holy Spirit. What we have learned is that sin, in this case, sexual immorality, can defile the body which is the temple of the Spirit. Therefore, it can be inferred that the Spirit can’t stay in a defiled temple. Moral sins are also sins that go against the Spirit’s refining process.
Mature Christians should not hurt new Christians in their new faith. In this case, when new Christians who had left paganism behind, see mature Christians in what seems to the new Christians participating in paganism, it leads them astray and back to the road of paganism.
Going back to paganism represented going back to idolatry which Paul says is really worshipping demons (10:14 - 11:1). Paul reasserts the Corinthians theology again:
1Corinthians 10:23 “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but not everything is constructive. 24 No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.
The most important thing to get out of this letter, is that one’s own flawed theology can lead to his/her downfall.
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