1 Corinthians 5:1 - Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

Bible Comments

It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife.

As a puffed-up spirit caused their strifes, Paul humbles them by convicting them of sin. The best community may have an individual offender; but its duty is to punish such a one. In this the Corinthians had failed.

Commonly, х holoos (G3654)] - rather, 'with all your self-satisfaction, it is actually, or after all, reported,' etc. The Greek word is adversative to a negative sentence understood or expressed. 'There ought to be no fornication at all; but nevertheless, it absolutely is reported.' So I must come invested "with a rod" (1 Corinthians 3:21).

It is reported. The Corinthians, though they "wrote" (1 Corinthians 7:1) on other points, gave Paul no information on those which bore against themselves. These matters reached the apostle indirectly (1 Corinthians 1:11).

So much as named. So 'Aleph ('). But A B Delta G f g, Vulgate, Lucifer, omit "named." 'Fornication so gross as (escapes reprobation) not even among the pagan, so that one (of you) hath (in concubinage; not marriage, as Alford thinks) his father's wife' - i:e., his stepmother, while his father is still alive (as Reuben, Genesis 35:22; Leviticus 18:8). She was a pagan, for which reason he does not direct his rebuke against her (cf. 1 Corinthians 5:12-13). Neither Christian nor Gentile law would have sanctioned such a marriage, however Corinth's profligacy might wink at the concubinage.

1 Corinthians 5:1

1 It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife.