1 Corinthians 4:10-13 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

We are fools In the account of the world, for Christ's sake Because we expose ourselves to so many dangers and sufferings for his cause: or because we preach the plain truths of the gospel, and affirm such high things of one who was crucified as a malefactor. But ye are wise in Christ Though ye are Christians, ye think yourselves wise; and ye have found means to make the world think so too: or, you think you have found out a way at once of securing the blessings of the gospel, and escaping its inconveniences and persecutions. We are weak In presence, in infirmities, and in sufferings: but ye are strong Just in opposite circumstances. Ye are honourable Adorned with extraordinary gifts, in which you are ready to glory, and some of you appear in circumstances of external distinction; but we are despised Treated with contempt wherever we come. Or the apostle may be considered in this verse as repeating ironically the things which his enemies in Corinth said of him, and as attributing to them, in the same spirit of irony, the contrary qualities. Even unto this present hour Not only at our first entrance upon our office, when all the world was set against Christianity, but still, though many thousands are converted; we both hunger and thirst, &c. Are destitute of necessary food and apparel, and exposed to wants of all sorts. Who can imagine a more glorious triumph of the truth than that which is gained in these circumstances? When Paul, with an impediment in his speech, and a person rather contemptible than graceful, appeared in a mean, perhaps tattered dress, before persons of the highest distinction, and yet commanded such attention, and made such deep impressions upon them! Being reviled, we bless, suffer it, entreat We do not return revilings, persecution, defamation; nothing but blessing, We are made as the filth of the world, and the off-scouring of all things Such were those poor wretches among the heathen, who were taken from the dregs of the people to be offered as expiatory sacrifices to the infernal gods. They were loaded with curses, affronts, and injuries, all the way they went to the altars. And when the ashes of those unhappy men were thrown into the sea, those very names were given them in the ceremony.