Text:

9 For I perceive that God has presented us apostles last, as men condemned to death. Because we have become a spectacle to the world, both to angels and to men. 10 We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are honorable, but we are dishonored. 11 To this very hour we hunger and thirst, we are naked, we are buffeted, and have no home, 12 we labor, working with our own hands; we are reviled, and we bless; we are persecuted, and we endure; 13 we are slandered, and we are admonished; we have become like the filth of the world, and the off-putting part of all things, until now. 14 I do not write these things to shame you, but I warn you as my beloved children. 15 For though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet you do not have many fathers, for I have begotten you in Christ Jesus through the gospel. 16 Therefore I urge you to be imitators of me.

the explanation:

In his first letter to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul addresses the issue of divisions in the church and factionalism for this or that apostle. His basis for this is “You are all Christ’s.” This is the principle that he will try to apply in the chapter published here when addressing the issue of the apostle, his message, and his relationship with the community.

At the beginning of this text, Paul uses the word apostle to refer to the Twelve and to himself, then he says that what accompanies the apostle is that he is a man who suffers greatly. Paul here refers to the sufferings that the apostle suffers during his preaching from people, crowds, and unbelief, and he defines the situation of the apostle who exposes himself to death, as happened with Paul on different occasions and in different places, like a man sentenced to death: “as though we were destined for death.” This reminds us of the passage that says: “We have this treasure in earthen vessels,” and then after that: “condemned to death…,” until he says: “Death is at work in us, but life is at work in you” (2 Corinthians 4:7-12).

“For we have not made this for the world, nor for angels, nor for men.” Paul here recalls how death sentences were carried out in his day: the condemned entered the arena and were placed before the ferocious beast. They certainly became a spectacle for the people to watch. The apostles carried the word of preaching, they were united with the word, they became the word. This is how we must understand them.

“We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise…” We are meant by the apostles. Beginning with his saying “we are fools for Christ’s sake,” the style is harsh and the words are harsh. The word fool used here means insane in Greek. “For Christ’s sake,” that is, seeking Christ, is understood to mean that the apostle is in “madness, ignorance, or weakness.” “You are honored”: in Greek you are in glory, and we are without honor, without honor. This whole passage is sarcasm, and refers to the subject he spoke about in the second chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians: human glory is nothing before God.

Then he continues to describe the suffering of the apostles: “Until this very hour we hunger and thirst, we are naked and slapped, we have no home (i.e. we have no home, meaning we are homeless), we labor and are insulted, we bless, we are persecuted, we endure, we are slandered, we implore…” Here the apostle strengthens the meaning of his words with the acceleration of actions, and clarifies his tolerant attitude towards people’s aggression. This attitude is also required of believers, not only of the apostles. What is required is for the believer to accept insult with love, even if it is considered the filth of the world, i.e. the garbage that people throw away.

“I do not write these things to shame you, but to exhort you as my beloved children.” In this verse, the Apostle Paul changes the tone and says: I have rebuked you sufficiently so that you may understand, not to shame you. He avoids rebuke and uses warning and advice because he loves them as his own children.

“For though you have ten thousand guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers, for I have begotten you in Christ through the gospel.” By guides he means teachers or educators, and the father is not the educator. He is talking here about a true spiritual fatherhood of people. He says: I begot you in Christ, and his principle is that everything happens through Christ, and everything outside this framework has nothing to do with the issue of fatherhood. With what did I begot you? With the gospel, with preaching, with the content of the good news for which I work, and not with anything else.

“I urge you to be imitators of me,” that is, to imitate me, and this is a stronger meaning than follow me. The apostle means walk as I walk, walk like me because I walk like Christ. The disciple imitates his teacher and father, but here the apostle Paul does not present himself as a Christian model to be imitated. He is an example to be imitated to the extent that he is weak, to the extent that he is nothing. He is nothing because Christ has become everything in him. The apostle who has come to this annihilation, you imitate him. He says in the first letter to the Thessalonians: “You became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word” (1:6).

All he says in this passage: This message, that is, the Gospel, I bring and I have brought it to you in its entirety. You must hold fast to its spiritual content. He accepts all the insults, but he does not give up his message and his fatherhood in Christ to those he preached to. He ends the problem of divisions with a beautiful verse that sums up everything he was saying: “What do you seek? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in love and a spirit of gentleness?” (1 Corinthians 4:21). 

Quoted from my parish bulletin
Sunday, June 30, 1996 / Issue 26