1 Corinthians 10:19 - Exposition

What say I then? What is it, then, which I am maintaining ( φημι )? That the idol is anything. St. Paul repudiates an inference which he had already denied ( 1 Corinthians 8:4 ). Is anything. Has any intrinsic value, meaning, or importance. In itself, the idol offering is a mere dead, indifferent thing. Of itself, the idol is an eidolon— a shadowy, unreal thing, one of the elilim; but in another aspect it was "really something," and so alone could the rabbis account for phenomena which seemed to imply the reality of infernal miracles ('Avoda Zarah,' fol. 54, 2; 55, 1; and see note in 'Life of St. Paul,' 2.74).