1 Corinthians 9 · Passage · Self-control
I Discipline My Body
In 1 Corinthians 9:24 to 27 Paul compares his own life to a runner's race and a boxer's fight, writing to the church at Corinth.
The verb Paul uses for making his body his slave, doulagogeo, stands nowhere else in the New Testament.
No, I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified.
- The passage
- 1 Corinthians 9:24 to 27
- Book
- 1 Corinthians
- When
- AD 57 (proposed)
- Hold in memory
- 1 Corinthians 9:25, 1 Corinthians 9:27
Summary
Paul wrote these four verses of his first letter to Corinth to close his answer about food sacrificed to idols. He had refused the support he had a right to, and he was ready never to eat meat again, so that others might be won to the gospel. Every athlete restrains himself for a crown that perishes, and Paul says believers do the same for a crown that lasts. His fear that he himself might be disqualified opens the warning of chapter 10.
- The verb of verse 25 for the athlete's training, enkrateuomai, belongs to the family of enkrateia, the self-control that closes the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:23.
- Verse 25 speaks of the games without naming them. The games at the Isthmus near Corinth were held every second year, and which plant crowned their victors in the years Paul wrote is not known.
- Teachers of the church read the word disqualified, adokimos, in four ways. Adam Clarke reads final rejection by God, Matthew Henry a warning by which God keeps the believer, Ambrosiaster the loss of the reward, and John Calvin a life at odds with one's preaching.
The Close of an Argument About Rights
Paul's resolve about meat in chapter 8 and his account of the rights he did not use in chapter 9 lead into the race.
These four verses are Paul's own account of self-control, told in the language of the athlete. He wrote them to Christians at Corinth who disagreed about what they were free to eat, and he answered by describing the restraint he placed on himself. Every reader who holds a right he could insist on, or an appetite he could feed, meets the choice Paul describes.
The question is what Paul means by disciplining his body, why he says it after a chapter about giving up his rights, and what he fears in the word disqualified. The study draws the passage as a ladder of four verses and reads the Greek verbs of each. It sets out what the record of the games near Corinth shows and what it leaves unknown, and it gives the four readings of disqualified with the teachers who hold them.
Chapter 8 warns the church that its freedom can become a stumbling block to the weak. Chapter 9 turns to Paul's own rights as an apostle, to food and drink, to a believing wife on his travels and to the support of the churches.
Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you yourselves not my workmanship in the Lord?Paul's four questions claim the freedom and the office that give him the rights he is about to list.
But I have not used any of these rights. And I am not writing this to suggest that something be done for me. Indeed, I would rather die than let anyone nullify my boast.This verse is the turn of the chapter, where the list of rights ends and Paul's boast in refusing them begins.
The whole of chapters 8 to 10, with its practical rule for eating in a city of temples, is taught on Food Offered to Idols.
The Ladder of Verses 24 to 27
Each of the four verses adds one picture to the last, the race, the training, the aim and the body.
Paul's race and boxing stand on the rights he gave up for the gospel and lead into the warning drawn from Israel in the wilderness.
An outline of eighteen rows in three parts, the rights given up, the four verses with the four readings of disqualified, and the warning of chapter 10, each verse in the Berean text.
Verses 24 to 27, from the Race to the Body
Paul moves from the runners and their one prize to the training of every competitor, and then to his own aim and his own body.
Verse 24 starts from what the church knew of a race, where all run and one wins, and makes it a command to run for the prize. In verse 25 the words trains with strict discipline render enkrateuetai, a form of the verb enkrateuomai. The STEP Bible lexicon from Tyndale House defines the verb as "to exercise self-restraint (in diet and chastity)". It stands in two verses of the New Testament, and the other is Paul's counsel on marriage.
But if they cannot control themselves, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to burn with passion.The verb's one other use speaks of those who cannot control themselves, and Paul tells them to marry.
In verse 26 Paul turns from the athletes to himself and names two faults he avoids, the runner with no goal and the boxer who hits nothing. The word rendered aimlessly is adelos, which the tagged Greek text glosses uncertainly.
In verse 27 Paul names what he does to his own body with two verbs. The first, hupopiazo, is the boxer's blow under the eye in the STEP Bible lexicon. Its one other use is the judge's complaint in Luke 18:5 that the widow is "wearing me out". The boxing word and the herald of the games are taught on The Race.
The STEP Bible lexicon defines the second verb, doulagogeo, as to enslave, and in a figure to subdue.
Teachers on verses 25 to 27Clement, Calvin, Wesley, Ryle, Clarke, Chrysostom
Clement of Alexandria, in the third book of his Stromata, writes that the athlete does not abstain from everything and is "self-controlled on such things as he thinks fit".
John Calvin's commentary on the letter draws its lesson from the frugal diet of the boxers. He applies it to the rights of believers: "Let us not, therefore, think it hard to give up a little of our right."
John Wesley's Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament call beating the air "a proverbial expression for a man's missing his blow, and spending his strength, not on his enemy, but on empty air".
J. C. Ryle, in the introduction to his book Holiness, cites Paul's words on running and fighting to show that "the true Christian needs personal exertion and work as well as faith".
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible reads doulagogeo as the wrestler's hold, "to trip, and give the antagonist a fall, and then keep him down when he was down".
John Chrysostom preached on verse 27 in his twenty-third homily on the letter. He has Paul speak of his own appetite: "Stubborn as appetite is and the tyranny of the belly, nevertheless I bridle it and give not myself up to the passion".
The Games near Corinth and the Victor's Wreath
Pausanias, the excavators of Isthmia and Plutarch record how the games near Corinth were held and what their victors wore.
Plutarch's Table Talk records a supper "in Corinth, in the time of the Isthmian games". The guests asked why the victor had been crowned "with a garland of pine, afterwards with parsley, and now again with pine". The priest Lucanius answered that pine came first and that parsley was taken over from the Nemean games. He added that "a little while after the pine recovered its ancient honor".
Plutarch wrote in the late first century or the early second. His priest's answer shows that pine crowned the Isthmian victors in Plutarch's own day and that parsley had crowned them at some earlier time. The plant of the wreath in the years of Paul's letter is therefore unknown, and verse 25 does not say which wreath Paul had in mind as the perishable crown.
Isthmia in Pausanias and the excavationPausanias, the excavators, Wesley, Clarke
John Wesley's Explanatory Notes and Adam Clarke's commentary both take the games of verse 25 to be those held "at the isthmus, near your city", in Wesley's words.
Pausanias, in the second book of his Description of Greece, saw at the Isthmus "a theater and a white-marble race-course". He gives the legend that Sisyphus buried Melicertes there and founded the games in his honor. He also reports that the games "were not interrupted even when Corinth had been laid waste by Mummius". The people of Sicyon held them while the city lay empty, and "when it was rebuilt the honor was restored" to Corinth.
Systematic digging at Isthmia began in 1952 under Oscar Broneer of the University of Chicago, and the excavators' own account calls the games biennial. That account adds that Corinth, refounded in 44 BC, regained control of the games about forty years later. It also states that the archaeological evidence suggests the games did not return to the sanctuary at Isthmia until about AD 50, a date that rests on the excavators' account alone.
The difference between the victor's wreath and a king's crown in the Greek of the New Testament is taught on The Crown.
From the Race to Israel in the Wilderness
Paul follows his own fear of being disqualified with the history of a people who all set out and most of whom fell.
Chapter 10 begins with Israel's forefathers, who "were all under the cloud" and "all passed through the sea".
Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, for they were struck down in the wilderness.This is the first warning Paul draws from Israel's history, set directly after his own fear of being disqualified.
Paul names four of their sins, idolatry, sexual immorality, testing Christ and complaining, and he says that for the last three many of them died (1 Corinthians 10:7 to 10).
How Teachers of the Church Read Verse 27
Augustine, Jerome and Gregory the Dialogist, the pope known in the West as Gregory the Great, read Paul's discipline as the self ruling the body, and Gregory joins it to compassion for a neighbor.
died 420 · Jerome
“Let our soul be in command and our body in subjection. Then Christ will come immediately and make his dwelling with us.”
Jerome · HOMILY 9 · on 1 Corinthians 9:27Patristic
died 430 · Augustine of Hippo
“Paul chastises what is of him and not what is himself. For what is of him is one thing, what is himself is another. He chastises what is of him so that he, being just, may bring about the death of bodily wantonness.”
Augustine of Hippo · Against Julian 24 · on 1 Corinthians 9:27Patristic
died 604 · Gregory the Dialogist
“For the cross is taken up in two ways: either when the body is afflicted through abstinence, or when the mind is troubled through compassion for one's neighbor. Let us consider how Paul had borne his cross in both ways, who said: ‘I chastise my body and bring it into subjection, lest perhaps while preaching to others I myself should become a castaway.’ Behold, in the affliction of the body we have heard of the cross of the flesh.”
Gregory the Dialogist · Forty Gospel Homilies, Homily 32 · on 1 Corinthians 9:27Patristic
Four Readings of Disqualified in Verse 27
Teachers of the church have read Paul's fear in four ways, and the words of the verse do not settle which reading is right.
The Greek word is adokimos, which the STEP Bible lexicon glosses unapproved, rejected, and it stands eight times in the New Testament. Abbott-Smith's lexicon, as the STEP Bible prints it, files verse 27 under persons "rejected after testing" with Romans 1:28, 2 Corinthians 13:5 to 7, 2 Timothy 3:8 and Titus 1:16.
Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so also these men oppose the truth. They are depraved in mind and disqualified from the faith.Paul uses the same word of men who oppose the truth, and the Berean text renders it as it does in verse 27.
Adam Clarke's readingAdam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible (1832)
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible applies the judges' verdict to God: "So Paul himself might be rejected by the great Judge; and to prevent this, he ran, he contended, he denied himself".
The case for this reading rests on those other uses of the word, and on chapter 10, which turns at once to Israelites struck down in the wilderness.
The objection is that the texts on the believer's perseverance stand against a fear of final loss, and Paul's last letter is among them.
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.Paul's last letter takes up the race of 1 Corinthians 9:24 again, now as a race he has finished.
Matthew Henry's readingMatthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible says Paul took pains "in subduing and keeping under bodily inclinations" so that he would not "miss the crown, be disapproved and rejected by his sovereign Judge". Henry adds that "A holy fear of himself was necessary to preserve the fidelity of an apostle".
In this reading the danger is real, and the fear it stirs is one of the means by which the apostle is kept faithful.
The objection comes from both sides. Those who hold Clarke's reading answer that a danger which can never happen is no warning, and those who hold Ambrosiaster's answer that the passage speaks of a reward and leaves salvation aside.
Ambrosiaster's readingCommentary on Paul's Epistles
Ambrosiaster's Commentary on Paul's Epistles reads the discipline as fasting: "To pommel the body is to fast and to avoid any kind of luxury". He adds that Paul "disciplines his own body so that he will not miss out on the reward about which he preaches to others".
The case for this reading is the picture itself, a prize and a crown in verses 24 and 25. An athlete ruled out by the judges loses the wreath and remains a citizen of his city.
The objection is that the lexicon files the verse with Romans 1:28 and Titus 1:16. There the word describes people God gave up to a depraved mind and people who deny Him, which is more than the loss of a prize.
John Calvin's readingCommentary on Corinthians
John Calvin's commentary sets aside the reading "I should incur the judgment of condemnation in the sight of God". He prefers one "referring to men", namely "that my character and conduct may not be inconsistent with my doctrine". He also allows a sense drawn from verse 23, "Lest I should be defrauded of the gospel".
The objection is that the word for having preached, keruxas, belongs to the herald of the games, which ties Paul's fear to the judge of the contest as Adam Clarke reads it.
Whether a believer can finally fall away is taught on Eternal Security.
The fasting Ambrosiaster names, and what Jesus taught about it, are taught on Fasting.
Running for a Crown That Lasts
Verse 27 ends with a fear Paul applies to himself first, as the preacher who could be disqualified after calling others to the race. He gave Timothy the same charge in the language of training.
But reject irreverent, silly myths. Instead, train yourself for godliness. For physical exercise is of limited value, but godliness is valuable in every way, holding promise for the present life and for the one to come.Paul tells Timothy to train himself for godliness and weighs bodily training against it, as he weighs the two crowns in the race passage.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- The tagged Greek text of the New Testament, with Strong's numbers, morphology and glosses (STEP Bible, Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0)
- STEP Bible TBESG, the brief lexicon based on Abbott-Smith (1922), entries g1467, g5299, g1396 and g96 (Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0)
- Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible (1832), on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710), on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- Ambrosiaster, Commentary on Paul's Epistles, on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- John Calvin, Commentary on the Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians, volume 1, translated by John Pringle, Calvin Translation Society, on 1 Corinthians 9:25 and 9:27.
- John Chrysostom, Homilies on First Corinthians, Homily 23, on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata, book 3, on 1 Corinthians 9:25 to 27.
- John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament (1755), on 1 Corinthians 9:24 and 9:26.
- J. C. Ryle, Holiness (1877, enlarged 1879), Introduction.
- Augustine of Hippo, Against Julian, on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- Jerome, Homily 9, on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- Gregory the Dialogist (Gregory the Great), Forty Gospel Homilies, Homily 32, on 1 Corinthians 9:27.
- Pausanias, Description of Greece, book 2, chapters 1 and 2, translated by W. H. S. Jones (Loeb Classical Library)
- Plutarch, Symposiacs (Table Talk), book 5, question 3, in Plutarch's Morals, volume 3, translated by several hands, revised by William W. Goodwin (Little, Brown, 1911)
- Cornelius Aherne, Epistles to the Corinthians, The Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4 (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1908)
- The Isthmia excavations, the excavation's website, the pages Home, The Site, and Myth and History.
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