성경 주석서

CHAPTER 10

1 Corinthians 10:1. γάρ] Elz. has δέ, against decisive evidence. An alteration arising from failure to understand the connection.—1 Corinthians 10:2. ἐβαπτίσαντο] A C D E F G א, min[1557] Dial. Bas. Cyr. al[1558] have ἐβαπτίσθησαν. Recommended by Griesb., adopted by Lachm. and Rückert. It is, however, an alteration to which copyists were induced by being accustomed to the passive of βαπτ.; the middle is sufficiently attested by B K L, Orig. Chrys. al[1559]—1 Corinthians 10:9. Κύριον] So B C א, min[1560] and several vss[1561] and Fathers. The readings Θεόν and Χριστόν are interpretations, the first occurring in A, 2, Slav. ms. Bede, the second adopted by Elz. Scholz, and Tisch. on the authority of D E F G K L, min[1562] vss[1563] Fathers; defended also by Reiche. Epiphanius avers Χριστόν to be a change made by Marcion.—1 Corinthians 10:9-10. Elz. adds καί after καθώς; but this has too powerful testimony against it to be admissible on the ground of 1 Corinthians 10:8. It is deleted by Lachm. Tisch. Rückert.—1 Corinthians 10:9. ἀπώλοντο] Rückert, following A (?) B א, reads ἀπώλλυντο, as he does also in 1 Corinthians 10:10 on the authority of A. Rightly in both cases; the change of tense was overlooked.—1 Corinthians 10:11. πάντα] is wanting after δέ in A B 17, Sahid. and several Fathers. It comes before it in D E F G א, 3, Aeth. and some Fathers. Bracketed by Lachm., deleted by Rück. and Tisch.; an addition naturally suggested.

τύποι] Lachm. and Rück. read τυπικῶς, following A B C K א, min[1564] Syr. p[1565] (on the margin), and many Fathers. Rightly; the Recept[1566], defended by Reiche, is a repetition from 1 Corinthians 10:6. As connected with τυπικῶς, however, and resting on very much the same attestation (including א), συνέβαινεν should be adopted in place of συνέβαινον.

κατήντησεν] Lachm. and Tisch. have κατήντηκεν, on the authority of B D* E* F G א, 39, 46, and some Fathers. An instance of the frequent transformation of the perfect into the aorist form, with which the transcribers were more familiar.—1 Corinthians 10:13. Elz. has ὑμᾶς after δύνασθαι; but this is an addition opposed by decisive evidence.—1 Corinthians 10:19. Lachm. Rück. and Tisch. invert the order of the two questions, following B C** D E א**, min[1567] Copt. Sahid. Aeth. Vulg. Aug. Ambrosiast. Pel. Bede. Rightly. One of the two queries came to be left out, owing to the similarity in sound (so still in A C* and א*), and was afterwards restored where it seemed to stand most naturally (according to the order of origin and operation). Reiche, nevertheless, in his Comm. crit. I. p. 240 f., tries to defend the Recept[1568] (K L, with most of the min[1569] Syr[1570] utr. Goth. and Greek Fathers).—1 Corinthians 10:20. ἃ θύει τὰ ἔθνη] Lachm. Rück. and Tisch. read ἃ θύουσιν, on very preponderant evidence (as also θύουσιν afterwards). The missing subject τὰ ἔθνη was joined on to θύουσιν (so still in A C א), which thereupon drew after it the change to θύει.—1 Corinthians 10:23. Elz. has μοι after πάντα, against decisive evidence. Borrowed from 1 Corinthians 6:12.—1 Corinthians 10:24. After ἑτέρου Elz. has ἒκαστος, in face of decisive testimony. Supplied, perhaps, from remembrance of Php 2:4.—1 Corinthians 10:27. δέ] is wanting in A B D* F G א, and some min[1571] Copt. Vulg. Antioch. Chrys. Aug. Ambrosiast. Pel. al[1572] Lachm. and Rück. are right in rejecting it as a mere connective addition.—1 Corinthians 10:28. ἱερόθυτον] approved by Griesb., and adopted by Lachm. Rück. Tisch. Elz. and Scholz again have εἰδωλόθυτον, contrary to A B H א, Sahid. and the indirect witnesses given by Tisch. The commoner word (which is defended by Reiche) was first written on the margin, and then taken into the text.

After συνείδησιν Elz. has τοῦ γὰρ Κυρίου ἡ γῆ κ. τὸ πλήρωμα αὐτῆς. A repetition of the clause in 1 Corinthians 10:26, which crept from the margin into the text; it is condemned by decisive testimony, as is also the δέ which Elz. puts after εἰ in 1 Corinthians 10:30.

[1557] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1558] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

[1559] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

[1560] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1561] ss. vss. = versions.

[1562] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1563] ss. vss. = versions.

[1564] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1565] yr. p. Philoxenian Syriac.

[1566] ecepta Textus receptus, or lectio recepta (Elzevir).

[1567] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1568] ecepta Textus receptus, or lectio recepta (Elzevir).

[1569] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1570] yr. Peschito Syriac

[1571] in. codices minusculi, manuscripts in cursive writing. Where these are individually quoted, they are marked by the usual Arabic numerals, as 33, 89.

[1572] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

CONTENTS on to 1 Corinthians 11:1.

The warnings supplied by the history of our fathers urge us to this self-conquest (1 Corinthians 10:1-11). Beware, therefore, of a fall; the temptation has not yet gone beyond what you are able to bear, and God’s faithfulness will not suffer it to do so in the future; flee, then, from idolatry (1 Corinthians 10:12-14). This exhortation is supported, as regards the eating of sacrificial meat, by the analogies of the Lord’s Supper and the Jewish usages in partaking of sacrifices (1 Corinthians 10:15-18). And therewith Paul returns from the long digression, which has occupied him since 1 Corinthians 9:1, to his main subject, which he is now in a position to wind up and dispose of with all the more vigour and terseness (1 Corinthians 10:19 to 1 Corinthians 11:1).

1 Corinthians 10:1. Γάρ] Paul had already, in 1 Corinthians 9:26 f., set himself before his leaders as an example of self-conquest; he now justifies his special enforcement of this duty by the warning example of the fathers. Πλεῖον αὐτοὺς δεδίξασθαι βουληθεὶς τῶν κατὰ τὸν Ἰσραὴλ ἀναμιμνήσκει, καὶ ὅσων ἀπήλαυσαυ ἀγαθῶν καὶ ὅσαις περιέπεσαν τιμωρίαις. καὶ καλεῖ τύπους τούτων ἐκεῖνα, διδάσκων ὡς τὰ ὅμοια πείσονται τὴν ὅμοιαν ἀπιστίαν κτησάμενοι, Theodoret.

οὐ θέλω ὑμ. ἀγν.] indicating something of importance. see on Romans 11:25.

οἱ πατέρες ἡμ.] i.e. our forefathers at the time of the exodus from Egypt. The apostle says ἡμῶν, speaking, as in Romans 4:1, from his national consciousness, which was shared in by his Jewish readers, and well understood by his Gentile ones. The idea of the spiritual fatherhood of all believers (Romans 4:11 ff., de Wette, al[1573]), or that of the O. T. ancestry of the N. T. church (Hofmann), would suit only with holy ancestors as being the true Israel (comp Romans 9:5 ff.; Galatians 6:16), but does not harmonize with the fact of the fathers here referred to being cited as warnings.

πάντες] has strong emphasis,[1575] and is four times repeated, the coming contrast of οὐκ ἐν τοῖς πλείοσιν, 1 Corinthians 10:5, being already before the apostle’s mind. All had the blessing of the divine presence (ὑπὸ τ. νεφ. ἦσαν), all that of the passage through the sea; all received the analogue of baptism, all that of eating, all that of drinking at the Lord’s Supper; but with the majority God was not well pleased.

ὑπὸ τ. νεφ.] The well-known (τήν) pillar of cloud (Exodus 13:21 f.), in which God’s presence was, is conceived as spreading its canopy over (ὑπό) the march of the people that followed it. Comp Psalm 105:39; Wis 10:17; Wis 19:7.

διὰ τῆς θαλ.] See Exodus 14.

[1573] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

[1575] Grotius: “tam qui sospites fuere, quam qui perierunt.”

1 Corinthians 10:2. The discourse flows on in uninterrupted stream, beginning with the ὅτι in 1 Corinthians 10:1, to the end of 1 Corinthians 10:5; then follows the application in 1 Corinthians 10:6.

εἰς τὸν Μωϋσῆν] in reference to Moses, so that they thereby devoted themselves to Moses as the deliverer and mediator whom God had sent them. Comp on Romans 6:3; Matthew 28:19.

ἐβαπτίσαντο] they had themselves baptized, had the same thing, that is to say, done to them in reference to Moses as you had done to you in reference to Christ. The middle, which is not put here for the passive,—comp, on the contrary, what was said regarding ἀπελούσ., 1 Corinthians 6:11,—is purposely chosen, as in Acts 22:16, to denote the receptive sense (see Kühner, II. p. 18; Valckenaer, p. 256; Winer, p. 239 [E. T. 319]); for although ἐβαπτ., and the subsequent ἔφαγον and ἔπιον, do not represent any apparent merit, yet they certainly assume the reception of those wonderful divine manifestations, which nevertheless could not place the fathers, to whom such high privileges had been vouchsafed, in a position of safety afterwards, etc.

ἐν τῇ νεφ.] ἐν is local, as in βαπτίζειν ἐν ὕδατι, Matthew 3:11, al[1579], indicating the element in which, by immersion and emergence, the baptism was effected. Just as the convert was baptized in water with reference to Christ, so also that O. T. analogue of baptism, which presents itself in the people of Israel at the passage of the Red Sea with reference to Moses, was effected in the cloud under which they were, and in the sea through which they passed. So far as the sacred cloud, familiar to the readers, is concerned, there is no need for the assumption, based somewhat uncertainly on Psalm 68:9, of a “pluvia ex nube decidua” (Wolf, comp Pott); neither, again, is it enough to define the point of comparison simply as Grotius does (comp de Wette): “Nubes impendebat illorum capiti, sic et aqua iis, qui baptizantur; mare circumdabat eorum latera, sic et aqua eos, qui baptizantur.” The cloud and the sea, both being taken together as a type of the water of baptism, must be regarded as similar in nature. Comp Pelagius: “Et nubes proprium humorem portat;” so also Bengel: “Nubes et mare sunt naturae aqueae (quare etiam Paulus de columna ignis silet).” Theodoret, on the other hand, with several more, among whom are Schrader, Olshausen, and Maier, makes the cloud a symbol of the Spirit (John 3:5); but this would have against it the fact, that the baptism in the cloud (answering, according to this view, to the baptism of the Spirit) had preceded the baptism in the sea (water-baptism); so that we should have an incongruous representation of the baptism with water and the Holy Ghost. The cloud and the sea do not represent the two elements in baptism, the former the heavenly, and the latter the earthly one; but both together form the undivided type of baptism. The type appropriated the subjects to Moses as his; the antitype appropriates them to Christ as His redeemed ones; and in both instances this is done with a view to their salvation, as in the one case from temporal bondage and ruin, so in the other from that which is spiritual and eternal. We may add, that there is room enough for the play of typico-allegorical interpretation, to allow the circumstance to be kept out of account that the Israelites went dry through the sea (Exodus 14:16 ff.). The most arbitrary working out of the exposition of details may be seen in Theodoret.

[1579] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

1 Corinthians 10:3-4. Just as all received the self-same type of baptism (1 Corinthians 10:1-2), so too all were partakers of one and the same analogue of the Christian ordinance of the Supper.[1583]

τὸ αὐτό] so that each one therefore stood on the very same level of apparent certainty of not being cast off by God.

The βρῶμα πνευματικόν is the manna (Exodus 16:13 ff.), inasmuch as it was not, like common food, a product of nature, but came as bread from heaven (Psalm 78:24 f.; Wis 16:20; John 6:31 f.), the gift of God, who by His Spirit wrought marvellously for His people. Being vouchsafed by the χάρις πνευματική of Jehovah, it was, although material in itself, a χάρισμα πνευματικόν, a food of supernatural, divine, and spiritual origin. Comp Theodore of Mopsuestia: πνευματικὸν καλεῖ καὶ τὸ βρῶμα καὶ τὸ πόμα, ὡς ἂν τοῦ πνεύματος ἄμφω διὰ τοῦ Μωϋσέως κατὰ τὴν ἀπόῤῥητον αὐτοῦ παρασχόντος δύναμιν. οὕτω δὲ καὶ πνευματικὴν ἐκάλεσεν τὴν πέτραν, ὡς ἂν τῇ δυνάμει τοῦ πνεύματος ἐκδοῦσαν τὰ ὕδατα. What the Rabbins invented about the miraculous qualities of the manna may be seen in von der Hardt, Ephem. phil. pp. 101, 104; Eisenmenger’s entdeckt. Judenth. II. p. 876 f., I. pp. 312, 467. Philo explains it as referring to the Logos, Leg. alleg. ii. p. 82, Quod deter. pot. insid. sol. p. 213.

πόμα] Exodus 17:1-6; Numbers 20:2-11. Regarding the forms πόμα and πῶμα, see Lobeck, Paral. p. 425 f.

ἔπινον … Χριστός] a parenthetic explanation in detail as to the quite peculiar and marvellous character of this πόμα. The imperfect does not, like the preceding aorist, state the drinking absolutely as a historical fact, but is the descriptive imperfect, depicting the process of the ἔπιον according to the peculiar circumstances in which it took place; it thus has a modal force, showing how things went on with the πάντες … ἔπιον, while it was taking place. Bengel remarks rightly on the γάρ: “qualis petra, talis aqua.”

ἐκ πνευματ. ἀκολ. πέτρας· ἡ δὲ πέτρα ἦν ὁ Χ.] from a spiritual rock that followed them; the Rock, however (which we speak of here), was Christ. Πνευματικῆς has the emphasis; it corresponds to the preceding πνευματικόν, and is explained more specifically by ἡ δὲ π. ἦν ὁ Χ. The relation denoted by ἀκολουθούσης, again, is assumed to be self-evident, and therefore no further explanation is given of the word. The thoughts, to which Paul here gives expression, are the following:—(1) To guard and help the Israelites in their journey through the wilderness, Christ accompanied them, namely, in His pre-existent divine nature, and consequently as the Son of God (= the Λόγος of John), who afterwards appeared as man (comp Wis 10:15 ff.). (2) The rock, from which the water that they drank flowed, was not an ordinary natural rock, but a πέτρα πνευματική; not the mere appearance or phantasm of a rock, but an actual one, although of supernatural and heavenly origin, inasmuch as it was the real self-revelation and manifestation of the Son of God, who invisibly accompanied the host on its march; it was, in other words, the very Christ from heaven, as being His own substantial and efficient presentation of Himself to men (comp Targ. Isaiah 16:1, and Philo’s view, p. 1103 A, that the rock was the σοφία). (3) Such being the state of the case as to the rock, it must of necessity be a rock that followed, that accompanied and went with the children of Israel in their way through the desert; for Christ in His pre-existent condition, the heavenly “substratum,” so to speak, of this rock, went constantly with them, so that everywhere in the wilderness His essential presence could manifest itself in their actual experience through the rock with its abundant water; and, in point of fact, did so manifest itself again and again. In drinking from the rock, they had their thirst quenched by Christ, who, making the rock His form of manifestation, supplied the water from Himself, although this marvellous speciality about the way in which their thirst was met remained hidden from the Israelites.

Since the apostle’s words thus clearly and completely explain themselves, we have no right to ascribe to Paul, what was a later invention of the Rabbins, the notion that the rock rolled along after the marching host (Bammidbar, R. S. 1; Onkelos on Numbers 21:18-20; and see Wetstein and Schöttgen, also Lund, Heiligth., ed. Wolf, p. 251); such fictions as these, when compared with what the apostle actually says, should certainly be regarded as extravagant aftergrowths (in opposition to Rückert and de Wette). It is just as unwarrantable, however, to explain away, by any exegetical expedient, this rock which followed them, and which was Christ. The attempts which have been made with this view run directly counter to the plain meaning of the words; e.g. the interpretation of Erasmus, Beza, Calvin, Piscator, Drusius, Grotius, Lightfoot, Billroth, al[1587] (which dates from Theodore of Mopsuestia), that the rock means here what came from it, the water (!), which, they hold, followed the people and prefigured Christ (ἦν). That ἦν denotes here significabat (so too Augustine, Vatablus, Salmasius, Bengel, Loesner, al[1588]), is a purely arbitrary assumption, seeing that Paul neither says ἐστί, nor τύπος ἦν, or the like, nor even indicates in any way in the context a typico-allegorical reference. This applies also against what Ch. F. Fritzsche has in his Nova opusc. p. 261: “The rock in the wilderness was a rock of blessing, strength, and life-giving for the Jews, and thus it prefigures Christ,” etc. Paul does not say anything of the sort; it is simply his expositors who insert it on their own authority. Baur, too, does violence to the apostle’s words (comp his neut. Theol. p. 193), by asserting that Paul speaks of Christ as the πνευμ. πέτρα only in so far as he saw a type which had reference to Christ in the rock that followed the Israelites, according to the allegoric interpretation which he put upon it.[1590] See, in opposition to this, Räbiger, Christol. Paul. p. 31 f.; Weiss, bibl. Theol. p. 319. The ordinary exposition comes nearer to the truth, but fails to reach it in this respect, that it does not keep firm enough hold of the statement, that “that rock was Christ,” and so of its identity with Him, but takes Christ to be the Rock only in an ideal and figurative sense, regarding Him as different from the rock from which the water flowed, but as the author of its supply. So, in substance, Chrysostom,[1591] Oecumenius, Theophylact, Melanchthon, Cornelius a Lapide, and many others, among whom are Flatt, Kling in the Stud. und Krit. 1839, p. 835; Osiander, Neander, Hofmann.[1592]

[1583] Bengel well says: “Si plura essent N. T. sacramenta, ceteris quoque simile quiddam posuisset Paulus.” At the same time, it should be observed that the ecclesiastical notion of a sacrament does not appear in the N. T., but is an abstraction from the common characteristics of the two ordinances in question. Both, however, are equally essential and characteristic elements in the fellowship of the Christian life. Comp. Baur, neut. Theol. p. 200; Weiss, bibl. Theol. p. 353.

[1587] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

[1588] l. and others; and other passages; and other editions.

[1590] Baur is wholly unwarranted in taking πνευματικός, ver. 3 f., in the sense of typical or allegorically significant. His appeal to Revelation 11:8 and Barnab. 10 is irrelevant.

[1591] οὐ γὰρ ἡ τῆς πέτρας φύσις τὸ ὕδωρ ἠφίει φησὶν οὐ γὰρ ἂν καὶ πρὸ τούτου ἀνέβλυζεν, ἀλλ ἑτέρα τις πέτρα πνευματικὴ τὸ πᾶν εἰργάζετο, τουτέστιν ὁ Χριστὸς ὁ παρὼν αὐτοῖς πανταχοῦ καὶ πάντα θαυματουργῶν.

[1592] Comp. his Schriftbew. I. p. 171: “The rock from which the water flowed was a natural one, and stood fast in its own place; but the true Rock that really gave the water was the צוּר יִשְׂרָאֵל (Isaiah 30:29), was Jehovah, who went with Israel.” By not calling the Rock God, but Christ, the apostle points forward, as it were (according to Hofmann), to the application which he is about to make of the words, namely, to the cup which Christ gives us to drink. But Paul’s words are so simple, clear, and definite, that it is impossible to get off by any quid pro quo. For the rest, it is to be observed that in this passage, as in the previous one, where the crossing of the sea is taken as a typical prefiguration of baptism, we have doubtless a Rabbinical process of thought on the part of the apostle, which, as such, is not to be measured by the taste of our day, so that this unvarnished exegetical conception of it might be set down as something “absurd,” as is done by Hofmann. The Rabbinical culture of his time, under which the apostle grew up, was not done away with by the fact of his becoming the vessel of divine grace, revelation, and power. Comp. Galatians 4:22 ff. Our passage has nothing whatever to do with Isaiah 30:29, where men go up into the temple to Jehovah, the Rock of Israel. It is of importance, however, in connection with Paul’s doctrine regarding the pre-existence of Christ and its accordance with the doctrine of the Logos.

1 Corinthians 10:5. Οὐκ ἐν τοῖς πλείοσιν] not with the greater part of them. A tragical litotes. Caleb and Joshua alone reached the land of promise. Numbers 14:30.

κατεστρώθησαν] were struck down. Comp Numbers 14:16; Numbers 14:29. Their dying in the wilderness (some by a violent, some by a natural death) is here vividly portrayed, in accordance with Numbers 14, as death by the hand of God (Herod. viii. 53, ix. 76; Xen. Cyr. iii. 3. 64; Jdt 7:14; 2Ma 5:26). Comp also Hebrews 3:17.

1 Corinthians 10:6. The typical reference of what is adduced in 1 Corinthians 10:1-5 to the Christians: These things (while they so fell out) became types of us, i.e. historical transactions of the O. T., guided and shaped by God, and designed by Him figuratively to represent the corresponding relation and experience on the part of Christians. See regarding τύπος, on Romans 5:14.

ἐγενήθησαν] The plural is by attraction from the predicate τύποι. See Kühner, II. p. 53 f.; Krüger, § lxiii. 6. Hofmann (comp 1 Corinthians 6:11) takes the Israelites as the subject: “They became this as types of us;” but the recurrence of the ταῦτα in 1 Corinthians 10:11 should have been enough of itself to preclude such a view.

ἘΠΙΘΥΜΗΤ. ΚΑΚῶΝ] quite general in its reference: desirers (Herod. vii. 6; Dem. 661 ult., and often in Plato) of evil things (Romans 1:30). To restrict it to the “Corinthios epulatores” (Grotius) is arbitrary; for it is equally so to confine the καθὼς κἀκεῖνοι ἐπεθ. which follows solely (Rückert, de Wette, Osiander, Neander), or particularly (Hofmann), to the desire of the Israelites for flesh (Numbers 11:4), whereas in truth the words refer generally to the evil lusts which they manifested so often and in so many ways upon their journey, that particular desire not excluded.

1 Corinthians 10:7. There follows now upon this general warning the first of four special ones against sins, to which the ἐπιθυμεῖν κακῶν might very easily lead. “Eligit, quod maxime Corinthiis congruebat,” Calvin.

μηδέ] also in particular do not. Comp Buttmann, neut. Gr. p. 314 [E. T. 366]. The repetitions of μηδέ which follow, too, from 1 Corinthians 10:8 to 1 Corinthians 10:10 are also negatived, but in continuance of the special prohibitions.

γίνεσθε] in the second person, because of the special danger to which his readers, from their circumstances, were exposed. Comp on 1 Corinthians 10:10.

ΕἸΔΩΛΟΛΆΤΡΑΙ] What Paul means is the indirect idolatry involved in partaking of the heathen sacrificial feasts. Comp on 1 Corinthians 5:11. This is clear from the quotation which he goes on to make (ΦΑΓΕῖΝ Κ. ΠΙΕῖΝ). Comp 1 Corinthians 10:14; 1 Corinthians 10:20-21. The passage cited is Exodus 32:6 according to the LXX.; it describes the sacrificial feast after the sacrifice offered to the golden calf. The ΤΙΝῈς ΑὐΤῶΝ, four times repeated, certain of them, notwithstanding of there being very many (although not all), brings out all the more forcibly the offences over-against the greatness of the penal judgments. Comp on Romans 3:3.

ΠΑΊΖΕΙΝ] to be merry. This comprised dancing, as we may gather from Exodus 32:19, and from ancient customs generally at sacrificial feasts; but to make this the thing specially referred to here (Hom. Od. viii. 251; Hesiod, Scut. 277; Pindar, Ol. xiii. 123) does not harmonize with the more general meaning of לְצַחֵק in the original text. To understand the phrase as indicating unchastity (Tertull. de jejun. 6) is contrary to Exodus 32:18-19, and Philo, de vit. Mos. 3, pp. 677 D, 694 A.

1 Corinthians 10:8. Ἐπόρνευσαν] Numbers 25:1 ff.

εἴκοσι τρεῖς] According to Numbers 25:9, there were 24,000. So too Philo, de vit. Mos. 1, p. 694 A; de fortit. p. 742 D; and the Rabbins in Lightfoot, Horae, p. 205; also Josephus, Antt. iv. 6. 12. A slip of memory on the apostle’s part, as might easily take place, so that there is no need of supposing a variation in the tradition (Bengel, Pott), or an error in his copy of the LXX. (Ewald). Among the arbitrary attempts at reconciliation which have been made are the following: that Paul narrates only what happened on one day, Moses what happened on two (Grotius); that Moses gives the maximum, Paul the minimum (Calvin, Bengel); that 23,000 fell vi divina, and 1000 gladio zelotarum (Krebs, after Bernard and Havercamp on Josephus, loc. cit.); that Paul states merely what befell the tribe of Simeon (Michaelis). Cajetanus and Surenhusius would have us read εἴκοσι τέσσαρες, as, in point of fact, is given in a few codd[1601], but manifestly by way of correction. Osiander too leans to this; comp Valckenaer.

[1601] odd. codices or manuscripts. The uncial manuscripts are denoted by the usual letters, the Sinaitic by א.