1 Corinthians 1:13 - Exposition

Is Christ divided? Has Christ been parcelled into fragments? "Is there a Pauline, a Petrine, an Apollonian, a Christian Christ?" Whether you call yourselves Liberals, or Intellectualists, or Catholics, or Bible Christians, your party spirit is a sin, and all the worse a sin because it pranks itself out in the guise of pure religious zeal. This is more forcible than to take the clause affirmatively:" Christ has been parcelled into fragments." In either ease we see" the tragic result of party spirit." Was Paul crucified for you? Again he rebukes the partisanship which attached itself to his own name. This showed a splendid courage and honesty. The introduction of the question by the negative μὴ expresses astonished indignation: "Can you possibly make a watchword of the name of a mere man, as though he had been crucified for you?" This outburst of feeling is very important, as proving the immeasurable distance which, in Paul's own view, separated him from his Lord. It is also instructive to see how St. Paul at once denounces the spirit of party without deigning to enter into the question as to which party of these wrangling "theologians" was most or least in the right. He did not choose to pander to their sectarian spirit by deciding between their various forms of aggressive orthodoxy. Into the name (comp. Matthew 28:19 ).