1 Corinthians 1:21 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

For after that, in the wisdom of God— There is some difficulty in ascertaining the precise meaning of these words. Some understand it to be, "That since the world, in the wisdom of God, that is to say, by contemplating the works of the creation, had not by wisdom, that is, by the exercise of their reason, arrived to the true knowledge of God, it pleased God to take another method, and by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe." It may seem strange, that the preaching of the Gospel should be called the foolishness of preaching, by an Apostle of Christ. But the meaning and language of St. Paul will be accounted for, by considering what led him to this kind of expression. The doctrine of the cross, and of the redemption of the world by the death and passion of Christ, was received by the great pretenders to wisdom and reason with scorn and contempt; The Greeks, says the Apostle, seek after wisdom,—and Christ crucified is to the Greeks foolishness. The pride of learning and philosophy had so possessed the politic parts of the heathen world, that they could not submit to a method of salvation which was above the reach of their philosophy, and which refused to be tried by the disputes and subtilties of the schools. The Apostle says, 1 Corinthians 1:17. Christ sent him to preach the Gospel, not with the wisdom of words. The wisdom of the world, thus discarded, took its revenge of the Gospel in return, and called it the foolishness of preaching. "Be it so (says the Apostle); yet by this foolishness of preaching, God intends to save those who believe: for this method is of God, and not of man; and the foolishness of God is wiser than man." Thus we see what led St. Paul to use this expression, and to call the preaching of the Gospel the foolishness of preaching. The great and learned so esteemed it, and so called it: the Apostle speaks to them in their own language, and calls upon them in the text to compare their much-boasted wisdom with his foolishness of preaching, and to judge of them by their effects: The world by wisdom knew not God; but the foolishness of preaching is salvation to every believer. The religion common to the heathen was idolatry; the knowledge of the Deity taught in the schools of the philosophers was such as deprived him of his noblest attributes, justice and mercy; and these very philosophers themselves ran down with the stream, and not only taught that the deities of their country should be worshipped, but likewise enforced their doctrine by their own examples, by worshipping them themselves. Such was the state of religion before the coming of Christ; philosophy had been tried; but instead of holding out a light to those that were in the gloom, it put out the little glimmering of light which remained. See Sherlock's Dis. vol. 1: Disc. 4: p. 139, &c. and Acts 7:18.