1 Coríntios 9
Augustine of Hippo · Comentário Patrístico (catena)
1 Coríntios 9:5
When his identity has been established, he shows that the privileges granted to the other apostles are his also, namely, exemption from manual labor and livelihood in recompense for his preaching as the Lord appointed. This is stated most clearly according to the verses where St. Paul argues explicitly that faithful women, possessing the goods of this world, went along with the apostles and ministered to them from their own supplies that the servants of God might lack none of those commodities which constitute the necessities of life… Certain persons, not understanding this passage, have interpreted it as "wife." The obscurity of the Greek word deceived them, since, in Greek, the same word is used for wife and woman. Yet the apostle has placed the words in such a way that people should not be deceived, since he says not merely "a woman" but "a sister woman," and not "to take in marriage" but "to take about."
1 Coríntios 9:5
To what right does he refer unless it be to the one which the Lord gave to those whom he sent to preach the kingdom of heaven when he said: "Eat what they have; for the laborer deserves his wages"? He offered himself as an exponent of this privilege. Very faithful women attended to the necessities of his life at their own expense.
1 Coríntios 9:6
The Lord directed those who preach the gospel to live by the gospel, that is, to maintain at the expense of the faithful that life for which food and clothing are essential.
1 Coríntios 9:7
The church has its own soldiers and its own provincial officers … its vineyard and its planters, its flock and its shepherds.… Thus some are rightly fed and clothed at the expense of the charitable rich. They accept nothing for their own necessities except from those who sell their goods. They are not to be judged and condemned by the more perfect members of Christ who furnish their own needs with their own hands—a higher virtue which the apostle strongly commends. They in turn ought not to condemn as Christians of lower grade those from whose resources they are supplied.… The servants of God who live by selling the honest works of their own hands could, with much less impropriety, condemn those from whom they receive nothing than could those others who are unable to work with their hands because of some bodily weakness yet who condemn the very ones at whose expense they live. — LETTER 157, TO HILARIUS
1 Coríntios 9:11
Paul emphasizes the fact that his fellow apostles were not transgressing in any way when they did not engage in manual labor to provide the necessities of life, but, as the Lord directed, living on the gospel, they accepted, without offering payment, bodily nourishment from those to whom they in turn furnished spiritual nourishment without demanding payment.
1 Coríntios 9:14
The apostle says this [here and in Timothy :-] so that Timothy might understand that what he took from those for whom he was, as it were, fighting, and whom he was cultivating as a vine, or feeding as a flock, was not a sign of begging but an acknowledgment of a right.
1 Coríntios 9:15
"For the laborer deserves his hire." He showed that this practice was permitted, though not commanded, lest perhaps a disciple who took some compensation for his personal needs from those to whom he was preaching might think he was doing wrong. That it was more commendable to omit this practice is shown clearly in the life of the apostle … [who] declared: "Nevertheless I have not used this right." … He possessed the right, but he did not bind his followers by a command. Since we are, then, unable to comprehend many passages, we gather from the deeds of the saints how to understand those passages which may easily be misinterpreted if reference is not made to the example set by the saints.
1 Coríntios 9:15
"The Lord directed that those who preach the gospel should have their living from the gospel. But I for my part have appealed to none of these rights." … What is clearer than this? What is more definite? My only fear is that, when I discuss the passage in an attempt to explain it, I may obscure that which is of itself patent and forceful. For, they who do not understand these words, or pretend that they do not understand them, understand mine much less.
1 Coríntios 9:17
Up to now I am so far restored in that glory that I confess I am ignorant not only how near I come to it but even whether I shall come to it at all. It is true I am a dispenser of eternal salvation along with my other innumerable fellow servants. "For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward." To be a dispenser of that salvation by word and sacrament is not at all the same as to be a partaker of it. Letter , To Audax.
1 Coríntios 9:20
A person who nurses a sick man becomes, in a sense, sick himself, not by pretending to have a fever but by thinking sympathetically how he would like to be treated if he were sick himself. Letter , To Jerome.
1 Coríntios 9:20
Paul was not pretending to be what he is not but showing compassion. Letter , To Jerome.
1 Coríntios 9:21
He did this by compassion, not by lying. For each one becomes like him whom he wants to help when such great mercy prevails as that each one would wish for himself if he were in the same misery. And so he becomes like the other—not by deceiving him but by putting himself in the other's place. — Against Lying 12
1 Coríntios 9:22
This is correctly interpreted to mean that he, not by lying but by sympathy, brought it about that he enabled their con-version by his own great love which made it seem as though he himself were afflicted with that evil of which he wished to heal them. — On Lying 21
1 Coríntios 9:24
It is not from the one who wills nor from the one that runs but from God who has mercy that we obtain what we hope for and reach what we desire. Esau was unwilling and did not run. Had he been willing and had he run, he would have obtained the help of God who by calling him would have given him the power both to will and to run. — TO SIMPLICIAN 10
1 Coríntios 9:25
When we enter upon the way of the Lord, let us fast from the vanity of this present life and refresh ourselves with the hope of the future life, not focusing our heart on things here but feasting it on things above. — SERMON 263
1 Coríntios 9:27
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. — AGAINST JULIAN 24