1 Corinthians 8:7,8 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Howbeit, there is not in every man In every professing Christian; that knowledge Namely, that there is but one God, and one Lord, and that an idol is nothing, and has no power to defile the meat: some Christian converts may not sufficiently apprehend this, but may imagine there is really some invisible spirit present in the idol, and acting by and upon it: for some with conscience of the idol Out of some respect to it, as if it were a kind of deity; unto this hour Even since their embracing of Christianit y; eat it The meat; as a thing offered unto an idol With some religious regard to the idol, intending thereby to pay some kind of homage to it; and their conscience being weak, is defiled “The weakness of their conscience,” says Macknight, “consisted in their believing that idols had a real existence as gods, and were employed by God in the government of particular countries and cities. And the defiling of their conscience consisted in their hoping to receive benefit from the idol, or at least to avoid the effects of his wrath, by joining in the sacrifice that was offered to him.” Others interpret the verse more consistently with the context, thus: Some eat with consciousness of the idol, that is, fancying it is something, and that it makes the meat unlawful to be eaten; and their conscience being weak That is, not rightly informed; is defiled Contracts guilt by so doing. But Why should we occasion this inconvenience? for we know that meat commendeth us not in any degree to the acceptance and favour of God Abstracted from circumstances; neither by our eating, nor by our refraining from it: eating and not eating are in themselves things merely indifferent. For neither if we eat What has been offered to an idol, are we the better, more holy in God's sight; neither if we eat not But conscientiously abstain from such meat; are we the worse Disapproved of by him, and exposed to his displeasure. “The great God does not so much esteem a man for being, or disapprove of him for not being, superior to such little scruples: but the tenderness of his conscience, together with the zeal and charity of his heart, are the grand qualities he regards.” Doddridge.