2 Cor. 614-71 As An Integral Part of 2 Corinthians

2 Cor.
6:14-7:1 as an Integral Part of 2 Corinthians

Author(s): Michael Goulder
Source: Novum Testamentum, Vol. 36, Fasc. 1 (Jan., 1994), pp. 47-57
Published by: BRILL
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Novum Testamentum
XXXVI,
1 (1994), ? E.J. Brill, Leiden
2 COR. 6:14-7:1 AS AN INTEGRAL

OF 2 CORINTHIANS
PART
by
MICHAEL GOULDER
Birmingham
The short paragraph 2 Cor. 6:14-7:1 has long posed a problem',

in that it seems difficult to see the drift of thinking which would fit
it into its context. Paul has been pleading for his converts' affection
in 6:11-13, and he returns to this theme at 7:2; but the intervening
verses are a stiff warning to them not to consort with &auaxotg,
unbeThe
it
as
is
rendered.
not
reads
like a
lievers,
usually
passage
only
foreign body, but also recalls 1 Cor. 5, where Paul had written the
"former" letter and had apparently said something similar. Hence
there has arisen a widespread suspicion that the verses are an intrusion into the present context; or more radically, that they are not
by Paul at all, or are a piece from Qumran2, etc.3
The lack of a clear thread of thought is the most serious problem
we face. A second one is the apparent contradiction with 1 Cor. 5;
for there Paul denies telling the church to shun the world of unbelievers, while here he seems to require it. The easy follow-on of 7:2
from 6:13 is not an important point, for Paul often recapitulates
after a digression. I am proposing to defend the integrity of the
present form of the text by a double argument therefore. First I will
suggest that 2 Cor. 5-7 show a sequence of thought which is found
twice elsewhere in the Corinthian letters; and second, I will argue
that tCraTot
in 2 Cor. means not unbelieversbut faithless Christians.
For a recent discussion and bibliography see Victor P. Furnish, II Corinthians
(Anchor Bible 32A, New York 1984), 359-383.
2
So J. A. Fitzmyer, "Qumran and the Interpolated Paragraph in 2 Cor 6:147:1", CBQ 23 (1961), 271-280, = Essays on the Semitic Backgroundof the New Testa-
ment(London 1971), 205-217.

3 There is a
good critique of radical solutions by Gordon D. Fee, "II Corinthians VI.14-VII.1 and Food Offered to Idols", NTS 23 (1977), 140-161; his own
solution is less convincing, v.i.

48
MICHAEL GOULDER
It is in the nature of human thought to follow established patterns. The succession of ideas which we have had before tends to
repetition under similar stimulation; and humility forces us to confess that this is increasingly the case in middle age. St Paul was no
exception, and this fact may help us to settle the longstanding
puzzle in 2 Corinthians.
The sequence of thought in 1 Cor. 4-6 is not difficult. Paul has
been under criticism (avaxptOj, 4:3) as not being a full apostle, and
he responds (A) by asking to be considered as a steward of the
mysteries of God (4:1-5). This leads him (B) to contrast his readers'
claims to be filled, reigning, etc., with the deprivations and persecutions of his apostolic life (4:6-13). This move is necessarybecause
other missionaries lived in style at church expense, and Paul cut a
shabby figure by contrast in the eyes of some of the Corinthians.
He has to show that such "weaknesses" are in fact an apostle's
glory, and the true badge of his apostleship. This in turn leads on
to (C), the assertion of his authority, like a father over his children
(4:14-21). This move is also in part necessary; it is the corollary of
his being considered a steward of the mysteries of God. It was
optional how the authority was asserted, and not every apostle
would have used the father-child image; but such gentle, family
images come naturally to Paul (Gal. 4:19, Eph. 5:1, 1 Thess. 2:11,
cf. 2:7), and he does not really mean it about the cane (4:21).
Why does Paul want to assert his authority? Because people are
not behaving properly, and he needs to stop it. Hence the reproofs
over the sexual and law-suit scandals in chh. 5-6. He knows it
would be ineffective to tell the sinners to improve, so he uses two
forms of community pressure. (D) He stresses the corruptingeffect
of tolerating such behaviour. It is like leaven which needs to be
cleansed out or it will infect the whole lump (5:6f). By contrast the
Church was to be a holy body, in the unleavened bread of sincerity
and truth (5:7); thought fit to judge the world, and even angels
(6:2f). Our body is a temple of the holy spirit: will we take the
members of Christ and make them members of a whore? (6:15-20).
But the only method by which such pressure can be made effective
is shunning. Hence (E) the requirement to keepawayfrom those who
break discipline. This may take the advanced form of handing the
sinner over to Satan in (semi)permanent excommunication (5:3ff);
or the temporary practice of "taking the evil out from your midst"
(5:9-13, citing Deut. 17:7), that is, not consorting with them or
eating with them.

2 COR. 6:14-7:1
49
Paul is reacting to a similar pressure in 2 Corinthians. In ch. 5

he is responding to those who boast in the surface (5:12), and claims
that he has the ministry of reconciliation (5:18), and is (A) a
minister of God. The thought is quite similar to 1 Cor. 4:1 Cor. 4:1 Let a man so reckon us as servants of Christ, and
stewards of the mysteries of God.
2 Cor. 6:4 But in everything commending ourselves as ministers of
God...
The paradoxical
But this leads on at once to (B) "...in all UT7coxovt'".
nature of Paul's ministry requiressome justification, and on comes
the gramophone record. This time it is a fuller exposition, more
eloquent and more paradoxical, but the underlying theme is the
same:1 Cor. 4:1 lf To this present hour we both hunger and thirst and
go naked and are beaten and are homeless and labour, working
with our own hands; reviled we bless, persecuted we endure,
slandered we encourage...
2 Cor. 6:4ff ... in persecutions, in necessities, in distresses, in
beatings, in imprisonments, in riots, in labours, in sleeplessness, in
fasting... by glory and dishonour, by slander and popularity...
The second list is fuller, partly because Paul has recently been
through further dire troubles, and partly because he has become
increasingly convinced that these experiences are of central
theological significance.
The catalogue of his trials is set out with such warmth of feeling
that Paul feels moved (C) to appeal to his converts' affection as his
children. The tone and the theme alike recall 1 Cor. 4:1 Cor. 4:14f I do not write this to reproach you but as counselling
my beloved children. For if you have ten thousand tutors in Christ,
yet you have not many fathers; for in Christ Jesus through the
gospel I begot you.
2 Cor. 6:1 lff Our mouth is opened to you, Corinthians, our heart
is widened; you are not narrowed in us, but in your own affections.
Make the same response-I speak as to my children-be widened
too.
In 1 Cor. the image of the kindly father leads on to Paul's coming
visit, and the (jocular) threat of the cane: in 2 Cor. the community's divisions have become deeper, and the affectionate father
asks at first for no more than to have his feelings returned. But Paul
is not a sentimentalist, and as in the other paternal passages cited

50
MICHAEL GOULDER
above, he wants to be a proper father to his children: to persuade

them to reject the zealous circumcisers (Gal. 4:12-20), and to walk
in holiness (Eph. 5: ff, 1 Thess. 2:9-12).
in
The way in which the Corinthians are to make their &avtLttaioa
2 Cor. is set out in the verses following, 6:14-7:1, which combine
the two community pressures of 1 Cor. 5-6. Paul both (D) stresses
the holinessof true Christians and in contrast the uncleanness
and
pollution that will ensue from contact with untrue Christians, with
whom they have nothing in common; and (E) demands separation
from the sources of infection, or in other words the shunning of the
Latrot, the unfaithful, by the church.
Paul says that trying to work with the 0aTtatot is like trying to
plough a field with a erep6ouyov,a yoke of two different animals, a

practice forbidden in Deut. 22:10 (the noun occurs in Lev.
19:19LXX). He draws five sharp contrasts to drive home the
incompatibility, some of them echoes of 1 Cor. 5f:1 Cor. 6:9ff Or do you not know that Hatxotshall not inherit the
kingdom of God?... And such were some of you; but you were
in the name of the Lord...
washed, you were sanctified, X8txaticOnl7c
between txa0tLooavr1
and
2 Cor. 6:14 For what is in common (xszToxil)
avoi(to?
1 Cor. 6:19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the
Holy Spirit which is in you?
2 Cor. 6:16 And what accord has the temple of God with idols?
1 Cor. 8-10 is a protracted discussion of the practice some Corinthian Christians had taken up of dining in an teltsXoov(8:10), or
in
eating meat sacrificed to an idol: Paul says one cannot xLTeXeLtv
the table of the Lord and the table of demons, nor should Christians
be xotvovouiS
of demons (1 Cor. 10:20f). We may again compare:2 Cor. 6:15 And what agreement has Christ with Beliar?
A fourth contrast, "Or what xotvovtio is there of light with
darkness?", is standard in Pauline paraclesis (1 Thess. 5:4f, Rom.
13:11, Eph. 5:8-13).
The overlap of language with 1 Cor. 8, 10 is so strong that it
must seem likely that the particular question Paul has in mind is
that of idol-meat.4 The roots teLTxEItv
and xotvovetv,the contrast of
4Fee (n. 3) stresses the community of language between the two passages, and
correctly infers that they are both about the same thing, viz. eating in an Et8o)XeTov.
But he mistakenly takes &itaCtotto be pagans (Christians were not to consort with
such in idol-temples,nor to touch what is unclean). Paul says "Do not share an alien

2 COR. 6:14-7:1
51
el3oXoawith Oe6g, and of Christ with demons/Beliar, and even the

rare [XoXua[L6of flesh and spirit, cf. the man whose conscience
[LoX)6vVTxt(1 Cor.
8:7),
bind the two passages
together.
A major
problem in 1 Cor., the idol-meat question had not gone away: in

2 Cor. 12:21 Paul speaks of "those who sinned before and did not
"-the idol-meat
and 7topvIa and &aO.eXyet
repent of their &xaoaxpaCa
uncleanness of 1 Cor. 8 and the sexual faults of 1 Cor. 5-6 and the
arrogance of "All things are lawful".
It is the temple image which is most fully exploited in 2 Cor. Paul
backs it with a series of OT citations intended to underpin his claim
that the true Temple is the Church. The first of these is Lev. 26:12,
"I will walk among you, and I will be your God and you will be
xXo; he
my people". Paul adapts by prefacing evotxilaco v ocUTxotlike
of
a
his
needs to establish God's indwelling
temple, and
people
hence its total holiness. Then Deutero-Isaiah had addressed the
(exiled) people as Zion and Jerusalem in Isa. 52:1, and had bid
them dissociate themselves from all uncleanness (52:11), and this is
just what is needed. Finally Isaiah had also spoken of the people as
God's sons and daughters (43:6-but there is a fuller form of such
a promise in 2 Sam. 7, which he actually uses), and this drives
home the need for absolute purity-"Therefore,
having these prolet
ourselves
from
us
cleanse
mises, beloved,
every pollution of flesh
[like idol-temple banquets] and spirit [quarrels, jealousies, etc., 2
Cor. 12:20], perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (7:1). The
catena of three adapted citations is weightier than the exposition of
the leaven in 1 Cor. 5:6-8, and the brief reference to the body as
a temple of the Holy Spirit in 1 Cor. 6:19; but the exploitation of
holiness imagery from the cult is closely parallel.
Things are more critical than they had been in 1 Cor.; and it is
the more necessary (E) to apply active discipline. Again we find a
similarity of tone and language between the two letters:1 Cor. 5:7 Cleanse out (ExxaOapa0re)
the old leaven...
5:13 Take the evil out (&apates) from you (Deut. 17:7 LXX).
2 Cor. 6:17 Wherefore come out (iSXOoare) from the midst of them,
and be separated, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing
(axaocapTou),and I will receive you (Isa. 52:11, Ezek. 20:34).
yoke with atlaTot"
generally, without special mention of an idol-temple-without
a precedingcontextno readercould have made Fee's sense out of the words.

Indeed there is no mention of an EI8woXEov
in the passage following.

52
MICHAEL GOULDER
The stress on separation from the unclean is the same in both letters, and the backing from scripture is the same. What Paul expects
is the same in both: the shunning of the "unclean" 6a:trot, their
exclusion from church meals and the breaking of social contact.
The differences are probably not material. The Isaiah citation
closed with the inapposite, "you who bear the vessels of the Lord",
and Paul has substituted from elsewhere in his memory of the prophets "and I will receive you". The wording of the Isaiah text suggests that the Pauline Christians split from the main body, but this
is surely not intended: Isaiah happened to say "come out, be
separated", but the stress Paul wants is on the separation, not the
coming out. He certainly did not want a Pauline rump, but to drive
out the obdurate sinners.
The satisfactoriness of this chain of parallels is enhanced by their
repetition in the same letter, in 2 Cor. 10-13, albeit in an extended
form. There also his apostleship is under attack, but (A) let his
opponents reckon that he is also of Christ (10:7), reckoning in
nothing to come behind the super-apostles (11:5), a ministerof Christ
more than they (11:23). This leads on to (B) a yet more eloquent
list of his weaknesses(11:23-33); and he adds, "I have been a fool,
you compelled me" (12:11)-his
glorying in his sufferings was
as
his
life
seemed such a paradox. The
inasmuch
required
apostolic
is
then
for
the
imminent
way
open
fatherly atmosphere-Paul's
(C)
visit, "I seek not yours but you; for children should not save for
parents, but parents for children ... If I love you the more, am I
loved the less?" (12:14-18). Then follows (D) the challenge to the
pure spiritual life: there is to be no strife, jealousy, anger, etc., and
Paul makes explicit the link with (C), "Everything, beloved, is for
your otxosopti" (12:19ff). But finally, (E) discipline needs to be
applied, and will be. "This is the third time that I am coming to
you: every case will be established at the mouth of two or three
witnesses
... If I come,
I will not spare ... So I write this in my
absence so that I may not use severely (a&oxt6.tLo

, off-cuttingly) the
which
the
Lord
me
for
authority
gave
building up and not for pulling down" (13:1-10). Paul wants the discipline to have been
applied before he comes, as he says in 6:14-7:1; otherwise he will
have to administer it himself.
We seem thus to have produced a plausible solution for a
longstanding problem. 2 Cor. 6:14-7:1 is an integral part of the letter, and belongs in its present context; it supplies the appeal for

53
2 COR. 6:14-7:1
holiness and the requirement of discipline which form the culmination of similar passages in 1 Cor. 4-6 and 2 Cor. 10-13. What then
is the objection to it? The objection is that amortxomeans pagan. As
Margaret Thrall puts it, "There is plenty of unambiguous evidence
which indicates that the Corinthians would have taken atLatTot to
mean unbelievers in the sense of non-Christians. This is quite
clearly what the word means in I Cor. vi.6, vii.12-14, x.27".5
This argument, which settles the matter for Windisch6, Barrett7,
Furnish8 and most commentators on the passage, is not strong:(i) J.-F. Collange9, who proposed that the &Ctrtot were Paul's
Christian opponents, appealed to the use of the word in 2 Cor. 4:4,
which I discuss briefly in a moment. Thrall's comment, "In iv.4
it is by no means obvious that Paul is speaking of his opponents",
is weak: if it should appear that armoro is used in this sense the only
other time it occurs in the letter, then the objection would virtually
disintegrate.
(ii) atClTTogoften means faithless, not pagan, elsewhere in the NT:
"0 faithless generation" (Mk. 9:19), "He will set his lot with the
faithless" (Lk. 12:46, in contrast to the tLroa6steward of 12:42),
"and be not faithless, but believing (tmot6)" (Jn. 20:27). Ignatius
uses it to mean docetic Christians (Tr. 10, Sm. 2, 5.3), and
Ignatius frequently bases his usage on that of the "sainted Paul".
to mean pagan, he might
(iii) Even if Paul usually uses XrcaTxog
wish to employ it as a term of abuse for immoral Christians. In 1
Cor. 5:1 he speaks of a woman who is living with (? married to) her
(? dead) husband's son, and in 6:15f it appears that she is referred
to as (io) c6pvtl, a term properly implying that she trades sex for
money.
(iv) 2 Cor. 6.15b says, "Or what part is there for a tcr~to with
an &(tCKou?".There is an obvious parallel between the two; but
7rLto6 is not used elsewhere to mean a Christian, to contrast with
pagan. So the natural translation is "What part has a faithful with
an unfaithful [Christian]?" This seems to be confirmed by the
5
M. E. Thrall, "The Problem of II Cor. vi.14-vii.1 in some recent discussion", NTS 24 (1977), 132-148, citation p. 143.
H. Windisch, Der zweite Korintherbrief(Gottingen,
1924), 218.
C. K. Barrett, TheSecondEpistleto theCorinthians

(Black, London, 1973), 195ff.
8 Furnish, II Corinthians, 361.
9
J.-F. Collange, Enigmesde la DeuxieneEpitreaux Corinthiens(SNTS MS18,
Cambridge, 1972), 282ff.

54
MICHAEL GOULDER
image of the yoke in lTEporuyouvrTe: the xtaot are bearing a common yoke with the a7tarot, that is, they are fellow-workers with
them,'0 and this must stop.
(v) The whole problem of 2 Cor. 6:14-7:1 arises largely from the
flat contradiction between its apparent policy (Have no contact
with 6&rtoLot,understood as the defiling pagan world) and 1 Cor.
5:9-13 (Paul did not mean, Have no contact with the defiling pagan
world; otherwise Christians would have to leave the world. He
meant, Shun Christian sinners)." Collange begins from this, and
Thrall concedes the force of the argument.12 But this difficulty
disappears if &XtLaot are immoral/non-Pauline Christians; and so
does that of the lack of context for the pagan interpretation, and the
thought that someone may have introduced a semi-Christianised
piece from Qumran.13
What then does atltatoS mean at 2 Cor. 4:4? It comes near the
end of a section, 2:14-4:6, of which the core is a contrast between
the glory of the Sinai dispensation and the greater glory of the
Christian dispensation (ch. 3). This is preceded and followed by
some reflections on the opposition:2:17 For we are not like the many trading the word of God, but as
with sincerity, but as from God before God do we speak in Christ.
4:2 not walking in rc0voupytanor counterfeiting the word of God,
but in the openness of truth commending ourselves to all men's
conscience before God.
"The many" (ot 7roXXoi)have been trading (xarrlXeuovxtg)the word
of God, that is the gospel, i.e. (probably) making money out of it,
10
Fee, "Idols" (n. 3), 475, points to oaiuyfo as an antonym to Eitpouyoov.
1
Very likely the misunderstanding that arose from the "former" letter was
due to Paul's use in it of atmoroi. He must have used some ambiguous term which
they understood to mean pagan unbelievers but which he intended to refer to
immoral Christians.
12
"Problem", 134. However, her own solution is not very convincing: Paul
"does not seem always to have been capable of taking adequate precautions
against misunderstanding" (148).
13
Recently (Nov. Test. 35 (1993) 160-180, "The Mind of the Redactor: 2 Cor.
6:14-7:1 in its Secondary Context"), P. B. Duff has argued that the artCoroLare
Paul's opponents. A major image of Paul's 2 Cor. was the Graeco-Roman
religious procession, and the originally continuous 6:13-7:2a ran, in line with this,
"Open up for us. Make room for us". But his stress on processional imagery
= "open up"; and the interseems dubious; he offers no parallel for iXaTUMvO7rl
pretation seems to ignore Paul's own contrast with ttvoXcope7T0aiv og o7Xdr&YTXvotS
in 6:12.
6UCiov

COR.
6:14-7:1
55
in 2:17; and they have been counterfeiting it (8oXo5vT;g)in 4:2.

This is a bit of mud-slinging, because at 12:16 Paul comments
ironically, "So be it, I did not exploit you; but being a 7Tavo6pyoS
I took you O6Xco!"
The opposition have accused him of 7ovoupyta
and 860Xo in that he did not take money from his converts. He
accuses them of iravoupyitaand 86XoSbecause they did, and he calls
it xatXriXEu,tv.
3:1 Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need,

like some, letters of commendation to you or from you?
4.2 commending ourselves to all men's conscience before God. The
opposition have criticised Paul for commending (oavtitavetv)
himself, and here he is at it again! No, he says, I commend myself
by my openness, while they depend on letters of commendation,
some of them written by the Corinthians themselves.
2:15 for we are Christ's fragrance to God in those who are being
saved and in those who are perishing...
4:3 And if too our gospel is veiled, it is veiled in those who are
perishing, in whom the god of this age has blinded the minds of the
St
amo LI...
The opposition have criticised Paul for preaching a xexoaXuuEi.vov

gospel, that is, an obscure message, and it would be natural for him
to reply, "Yes, it is obscure to you, because you have been blinded
by the devil". However, many soft hearts quail at the thought of
the apostle being so harshly dogmatic, and would like to think that
the great defender of salvation by faith never consigned a fellowChristian to perdition.14
The evidence is not helpful to this charitable view. At 1 Cor. 3:17
Paul says, "If anyone destroys the temple of God, him will God
destroy"; the "anyone" here is a Christian missionary who has
been building something alien on Paul's foundation, although he
escapes with the purging fire two verses earlier. At Phil. 3:19 the
end of the Jewish Christian "dogs", with their circumcision, is
destruction (&tCbXtaL). At 1 Cor. 1:18 we have the same contrast
between TOrTao,UOXXulevotqand TOTtac)ooLevotL as in 2 Cor. 2:15.
Here the &aoXXuile.votthink the word of the cross to be foolishness,
and they are then categorised as three representatives of Jewish
and ca4rrtixrlg.These correspond to
wisdom, the aoop6, ypaocr.iaxeug
14
So, recently, Judith Gundry Volf, Paul and Perseverance(WUNT 2/37, Mohr,
Tiubingen 1990).

56
MICHAEL GOULDER
the Jewish MFn, lID, and ttnTI, and the wisdom which they
advocate is the Jewish way of life, built on the fear of the Lord, viz.
the ;D5T1-described by Paul as "taught words of human wisdom"
(2:13).15 Those being saved are, in other words, those who accept
the Pauline gospel of the cross, and those perishing are those within
the Churchwho reject this gospel, i.e. the Jewish Christian leaders,
and those who are deceived by their claims of wisdom. The whole
the whole epistle-is about trouble
section, 1 Cor. 1-4-indeed
within the Church, instigated by those "of Cephas", but transferred (pEuTeoXTlhz[ata)on to himself and Apollos for pastoral reasons
(8t' 46(1, 4:6).
The same is true of 2 Thess. 2. Here Paul warns the church not
to be deceived (L~TTtI uia?.S ttastca/lo'q)by spirit or word or letter,
that is, by otherChristians,with the doctrine that the Day of the Lord
has arrived. First must come the Lawless One, whose coming is in
because they did
all deceit (&axr) of wickedness TOTia&7oXXuu.voLg,
not accept the love of the truth to their salvation. And for this
reason God is sending on them the working of error (tX,avrs) to the
believing of a lie, that all who have not believed the truth, but have
approved wickedness, may be judged" (2:10ff). The opposition are
already deceiving the Church with their false teaching, this IX&avi
which God has sent on them, and they will be judged for it; but all
who swallow their error, and are deceived into wickedness,
too. The attention of the letter is
are perishing (a&7oXXuJ,6Lvot)
on
focussed
intra-Church
entirely
problems-withstanding
persecution, false teaching of realised eschatology, giving up work:
there is no thought of the unhappy fate of the unconverted.
It is possible to make sense of 2 Cor. 2:14-4:6 on this basis alone.
The two flanking paragraphs, 2:14-3:3 and 4:1-6, are attacks on
countermoney-making,
gospel-corrupting,
self-commending
missionaries who are going to hell (&7roXXus,tvoL).
The body of ch.
3 is not a contextless midrash on Exod. 34 vaguely directed at
"unbelieving Israel".'6 The line for Paul does not run between two
religions, Judaism and Christianity. It runs between those whose
faith is in the gospel of the cross of Christ, Pauline Christians, and
those whose trust is in the works of the law, whether they call them15
See my "1optia in 1 Corinthians", NTS 38 (1991), 516-538.

So Windisch, 117-125; modified by Furnish, 200-252, but still with
"unbelieving Israel" in the background (233f).
16

2 COR. 6:14-7:1
57
selves Jews or Christians. When one turns to the Lord, the veil is
removed, and there is freedom (2 Cor. 3:16f); those are cut off from
Christ whose justification is in the Law (Gal. 5:4). 2 Cor. 3 strongly
recalls Galatians and Romans. It maintains a new covenant,not of the
letterbut of theSpirit (3:6, cf. Rom. 2:29, 7:6, Gal. 4:24). It holds that
the letterkills but the Spirit makesalive (3:6, cf. Rom. 8:2, Gal. 2:19f).
It offers a life of freedom in the Spirit (3:16, cf. Gal. 5:1).
So a natural reading of 2 Cor. 4:3f seems entirely apposite. Yes,
says Paul, if my gospel seems obscure (xexa0Xu,ulovov),it is obscure
among Christians who are perishing, among whom the devil has
blinded the minds of the faithless (xtrv iXToctov).This time it is not
God but the devil who has made life difficult for them. As at 6:14ff,
OxtatoS does not mean pagan but faithless.


2 Cor. 614-71 As An Integral Part of 2 Corinthians

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2 Cor. 614-71 As An Integral Part of 2 Corinthians

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2 Cor.

6:14-7:1 as an Integral Part of 2 Corinthians

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1 (1994), ? E.J. Brill, Leiden