Homily 18 — First Corinthians 6, verses 15 to 20

“Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Far from it!” [a]

Having passed on from the sexually immoral man to the greedy man, he now comes back from the second to the first. He no longer speaks to that man himself, but to the others, who had not committed sexual immorality. And even while he is securing them against falling into the same sins, he strikes at him again. For the man who has sinned is stung even that way, though you direct your words to someone else: his conscience is thoroughly awakened and whips him.

The fear of punishment was certainly enough to keep them chaste. But since he does not wish to set these matters right by fear alone, he uses both threats and reasons.

On that other occasion, once he had stated the sin, prescribed the punishment, and pointed out the harm that dealings with the sexually immoral man brought on them all, he left the subject and passed on to greed. And after threatening the greedy, and all the rest he named, with being shut out of the kingdom, he brought his discourse to a close. But here he takes up the work of warning in a still more fearful way. For the one who only punishes a sin, and does nothing to show how utterly lawless it is, achieves nothing very great by his correction. And again, the one who only shames, and does not frighten by his way of punishing, does not strike very hard at people whose minds are hardened.

That is why Paul does both. Here he shames them, saying, “Do you not know that we will judge angels?” There he frightens them, saying, “Do you not know that the greedy will not inherit the kingdom of God?”

And with the sexually immoral man he again follows this order of speaking. He had frightened him by what he said before: first cutting him off and handing him over to Satan, and then reminding him of that day which is coming. Now he shames him again by saying, “Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ?” — from here on speaking to them as to children of noble birth. He had said, “Now the body is for the Lord”; now he makes it plainer. And in another place too he does this same thing, saying, “Now you are the body of Christ, and individually members of it” (First Corinthians 12, verse 27). He often uses the same figure, though not with the same aim: at one time to show his love, at another to increase their fear. But here he has used it to startle them and fill them with alarm. “Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? Far from it!” Nothing could be better suited to strike horror than this expression. He did not say, “Shall I take the members of Christ and join them to a prostitute?” but what? “Make them members of a prostitute” — which would surely strike harder.

Then he shows how the sexually immoral man becomes this, saying, “Do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute is one body?” How is this evident? “For the two,” he says, “will become one.”

Verse 17: “But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit.”

For the union does not let the two be two any longer, but makes them both one.

Notice again how he proceeds with the bare terms themselves, pressing his charge simply by naming the prostitute and Christ.

Verse 18: “Flee sexual immorality.”

He did not say, “Keep away from sexual immorality,” but “Flee”: that is, work with all your zeal to get yourselves free of that evil. “Every sin that a person commits is outside the body, but the one who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.” This argument is a lesser one than the one before. But since he had to speak about the sexually immoral, he enlarges on that guilt with arguments drawn from every side, from greater things and smaller alike, making the charge a grave one. And in fact the earlier argument was addressed to the more devout, and this one to the weaker sort. For this too is typical of Paul’s wisdom: he brings forward not only the great things to shame people with, but the lesser ones as well — the thought of what is disgraceful and unseemly.

“What then?” you say. “Does the murderer not stain his hand? And what about the greedy man and the robber?” That is plain to everyone, I suppose. But since he could name nothing worse than the sexually immoral man, he enlarges on the crime another way, by saying that in the sexually immoral man the whole body is defiled. It is as polluted as if it had fallen into a vat of filth and been plunged in defilement. And this is how we ourselves behave. No one coming from greed and robbery would hurry off to a bath; he goes home as though nothing had happened. But a man coming from a prostitute goes to a bath, as one who has become entirely unclean. That is how strong a sense of unusual shame the conscience keeps from this sin. Yet both are bad, greed and sexual immorality alike, and both throw people into hell. But Paul does everything with skill, and so he made the sin of sexual immorality look as great as he could by every argument he had.

Verse 19: “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you?” [c]

He did not merely say, “of the Spirit,” but “who is in you” — the language of one who was also soothing them. And explaining himself still further, he added, “whom you have from God.” He named the Giver as well, both raising up the hearer and making him afraid, by the greatness of what was entrusted to him and by the generosity of the one who entrusted it.

“And you are not your own.” This is meant not only to shame them, but even to force people toward virtue. “Why,” he says, “do you do whatever you please? You are not your own master.” But he said these things not to take away free will. When he says, “All things are lawful for me, but not all things are to my advantage,” he does not take away our liberty. And here again, when he writes, “You are not your own,” he does not infringe on our freedom of choice. He is leading us away from vice and showing the Lord’s guarding care. And that is why he added, “For you were bought with a price.”

“But if I am not my own, on what ground do you demand duties of me? And why do you go on to say again, ‘So glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s’?” What, then, is the meaning of “You are not your own”? And what does he want to prove by it? He wants to settle them in safety against sin, and against following the improper desires of the mind. For we do have many improper wishes; but we must hold them down, for we can. If we could not, urging us on would be in vain. Notice, then, how he secures his ground. After saying, “You are not your own,” he does not add, “but are under compulsion,” but “You were bought with a price.” Someone might perhaps say: “Why do you say this? Surely you should have persuaded people on some other ground, by pointing out that we have a Master.” But that we have in common with the Greeks as well, whereas the words “You were bought with a price” belong to us alone. For he reminds us of how great the benefit was and of the way we were saved, showing that when we had become estranged we were “bought” — and not simply “bought,” but “with a price.”

“So glorify — take up and carry — God in your body and in your spirit.” He says these things so that we may not only flee sexual immorality in the body, but also, in the spirit of our mind, keep away from every wicked thought and from driving grace away.

“Which are God’s.” Since he had said “your,” he added “which are God’s,” continually reminding us that everything belongs to the Lord: body and soul and spirit. Some say that the words “in the spirit” mean the gift of grace; for if that is in us, God is glorified. And this will happen if we have a clean heart.

But he has spoken of these things as God’s not only because he brought them into being, but also because, when they had become estranged, he won them back a second time, paying the blood of the Son as the price. See how he brought the whole work to completion in Christ, how he raised us up into heaven. “You are members of Christ,” he says; “you are a temple of the Spirit.” So do not become “members of a prostitute.” For it is not your body that is insulted, since it is not your body at all, but Christ’s. He said these things both to make plain his love for humankind, in that our body is his, and to draw us away from all evil license. “If the body belongs to another,” he says, “you have no right to insult another’s body — least of all when it is the Lord’s — or to pollute a temple of the Spirit.” If anyone who breaks into a private house and forces his way in on a drunken spree must answer for it most severely, think what dreadful things the man will suffer who turns a temple of the King into a robber’s hideout.

So, considering these things, revere him who lives within you, for he is the Comforter. Tremble before him who is wrapped around you and clings to you, for he is Christ. Have you really made yourself members of Christ? Think about this and stay chaste: whose members they were, and whose they have become. Once they were members of a prostitute, and Christ has made them members of his own body. From now on, then, you have no authority over them. Serve him who has set you free.

Suppose you had a daughter, and in utter madness you had hired her out to a pimp and made her live a prostitute’s life. Then a king’s son passed by, freed her from that slavery, and took her in marriage. From then on you would have no power to bring her into the brothel, for you gave her up once for all and sold her. Our case is just like this. We hired out our own flesh to the devil, that cruel pimp. Christ saw it and set it free, and took it away from that evil tyranny. So it is no longer ours, but his who delivered it. If you are willing to treat it as a King’s bride, no one stands in your way; but if you take it back where it was before, you will suffer just what those who are guilty of such outrages deserve. So you ought to adorn it rather than disgrace it. For you have no authority over the flesh for wicked cravings, but only for the things God may command.

At least let the thought come into your mind of how great an outrage God has delivered it from. For truly, no prostitute ever exposed herself as shamefully as our nature did before this. Robberies, murders, and every wicked thought came in and lay with the soul, and for a small and cheap fee: the pleasure of the moment. For the soul, mixed up in every wicked scheme and deed, reaped this reward and no other.

Yet in the time before this, bad as it was to be like this, it was not so bad. But after heaven, after the King’s courts, after sharing in the awesome mysteries, to be defiled again — what pardon will that have? Or do you not think that the greedy too, and all those he listed before, have the devil lying with them? And do you not judge that the women who beautify themselves for defilement have intercourse with him? Why, who will contradict this word? But if anyone wants to argue, let him uncover the souls of the women who behave in this unseemly way, and he will surely see the wicked demon wound tightly around them. For it is hard, brothers and sisters, it is hard — perhaps even impossible — for the soul to be beautified at the same time that the body is being beautified like this. One must be neglected while the other is cared for. Nature does not allow the two to happen together.

That is why he says, “He who is joined to a prostitute is one body; but he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit.” For such a person becomes spirit from then on, though a body wraps him round. When there is nothing bodily, nothing coarse, nothing earthly about him, the body merely wraps him round, since the whole governing of him lies in the soul and the Spirit. This is how God is glorified. That is why in the Prayer we are commanded to say, “Hallowed be your name,” and Christ also says, “Let your light shine before people, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” [f]

This is how the heavens glorify him too: uttering no voice, but drawing wonder by the sight of them and referring the glory to the great Craftsman. Let us glorify him in the same way, or rather even more than they do. For we can if we want to. The sky, the day, and the night do not glorify God as much as a holy soul does. Someone gazing at the beauty of the sky says, “Glory to you, O God! How lovely a work you have made!” So too when he sees virtue in any person — and far more so in this second case. For not everyone glorifies God because of these works of creation. Many even claim that the things that exist move by themselves, and others credit the demons with the making of the world and with its providence. These people go badly and unforgivably wrong. But no one will have the power to hold such shameless opinions about a person’s virtue. He will surely glorify God when he sees someone who serves him living in goodness.

For who could help being astonished when someone who is human, who shares our common nature and lives among other people, does not yield at all to the swarm of passions, like a diamond? When, in the midst of fire and iron and wild beasts, he is even harder than diamond and conquers everything for the sake of the word of godliness? When he is wronged, and blesses; when he is slandered, and praises; when he is mistreated, and prays for those who wrong him; when he is plotted against, and does good to those who fight him and lay traps for him? These things, and things like them, will glorify God far more than the sky. The Greeks feel no awe when they look at the heavens; but when they see a holy man practicing a severe way of life with all strictness, they shrink back and condemn themselves. For when one who shares the same nature as themselves is so far above them — much farther than the sky is above the earth — even against their will they think it is a divine power that does these things. That is why he says, “And glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

Would you like to learn from another passage as well how God is glorified by the life of his servants, and how by miracles? Nebuchadnezzar once threw the three young men into the furnace. Then, when he saw that the fire had not overpowered them, he said, “Blessed be God, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants out of the furnace, because they trusted in him and have set aside the king’s word” (Daniel 3, verse 28). What are you saying? You have been despised, and you admire the men who spat on you? “Yes,” he says, “and for this very reason, that I was despised.” And he gives this as the reason for his wonder. So glory was given to God at that time not because of the miracle alone, but also because of the resolve of those who had been thrown in. [h]

Now if anyone were to examine each of these two things on its own, this one would appear no less than that. For to persuade souls to brave a furnace is no less a wonder than to deliver them from a furnace. How could it be anything but astonishing that the emperor of the world — with so many weapons around him, and legions, and generals, and viceroys, and consuls, and land and sea under his rule — should be despised by captive youths? That the bound should overcome the one who bound them, and conquer that whole army? The king and his company had no power to do what they wanted, no, not even with the furnaces for an ally. But those who were naked, and slaves, and foreigners, and few — for what number could be more contemptible than three? — and in chains, defeated an army beyond counting. For already death was being despised, since Christ was soon to come and dwell in the world. When the sun is just about to rise, the daylight grows bright even before its rays appear; so too, when the Sun of righteousness was about to come, death even then began to withdraw. What could be more splendid than that spectacle? What more glorious than that victory? What more remarkable than those new trophies of theirs?

The same thing happens in our own time too. Even now there is a king of the Babylonian furnace; even now he kindles a flame fiercer than that one. Even now there is such an image, and one who commands people to admire it. Beside him stand satraps and soldiers and bewitching music. And many gaze in admiration at this image, so varied and so great. For greed is something of the same kind as that image. It does not look down even on iron. Unlike each other as the materials it is made of are, it commands people to admire them all: bronze and iron, and things far more common than these.

But as things were then, so even now there are some who rival those young men, who say, “We do not serve your gods, and we do not worship your images; but we endure the furnace of poverty and every other distress for the sake of God’s laws.” And the wealthy, for their part, like those men of that time, often worship this image too, and are burned. But those who own nothing despise even this image, and though they are poor, they are more in the dew than those who live in luxury. So it was then: those who threw them into the fire were burned up, while those in the middle of it found themselves in dew, as if in rain. That tyrant, too, was burned by the flame more than those young men were, as his rage set him violently alight. As for them, the fire had no power to touch even the ends of their hair; but rage burned up his mind more fiercely than that fire. Think what it meant that, with so many looking on, he should be scorned by captive youths!

It was a sign, too, that he had taken their city not by his own might, but because of the sins of the mass of the people. For if he had no power to overcome these men in chains, and that when they had been thrown into a furnace, how could he have overcome the Jews in regular warfare, had they all been like these? From this it is plain that the sins of the many betrayed the city.

But notice too the young men’s freedom from empty glory. They did not leap into the furnace; they kept in advance Christ’s command, where he says, “Pray that you may not enter into trial” (Matthew 26, verse 41). Nor did they shrink back when they were brought to it. They stood in the middle nobly, neither rushing into the contest without being summoned, nor playing the coward when they were summoned, but ready for everything, noble, and full of all boldness of speech. [m]

But let us hear what they say as well, so that from this too we may learn their lofty spirit. “There is a God in heaven who is able to deliver us” (Daniel 3, verse 17). They take no thought for themselves; even when they are about to be burned, the glory of God is all they think of. What they say amounts to this: “In case, if we are burned, you should charge God with weakness, we now declare our whole teaching to you exactly. ‘There is a God in heaven’ — not like this image here on earth, this lifeless and mute thing, but one able to snatch us even out of the middle of the burning fiery furnace. So do not accuse him of weakness for allowing us to fall into it. He is so powerful that after we have fallen in, he is able to snatch us out of the flame again. ‘But if not, let it be known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods, or worship the golden image that you have set up.’”

Notice that by God’s special arrangement they do not know the future. If they had known it beforehand, there would have been nothing wonderful in their doing what they did. What marvel is it if, with a guarantee of safety, they defied every terror? God would indeed have been glorified, since he was able to deliver from the furnace; but they would not have been admired, since they would not have thrown themselves into any danger. For this reason he let them be ignorant of the future, so that he might glorify them all the more. And just as they took care to guard the king against accusing God of weakness even if they were burned, so God accomplished both purposes: he displayed his own power, and he made the young men’s zeal stand out more plainly.

Where, then, did their doubt come from, their not feeling sure that they would be saved in any event? It was because they certainly thought themselves too lowly and unworthy of such a favor. And to prove that I am not saying this by guesswork: when they fell into the furnace, they lamented over themselves in this way, saying, “We have sinned, we have done wrong, we cannot open our mouth” (Song of the Three Young Men, verses 6 and 10). That is why they said, “But if not.” And if they did not say plainly, “God is able to deliver us; but if he does not deliver us, it will be because of our sins that he does not,” do not be surprised. For they would have seemed to the barbarians to be covering up God’s weakness with the excuse of their own sins. That is why they speak only of his power and do not give the reason. Besides, they had been well trained not to pry with curiosity into the judgments of God.

With these words, then, they went into the fire. They did not hurl insults at the king, or overturn the statue. For this is what the courageous man should be: self-controlled and mild, and especially in dangers, so that he does not seem to go into such contests out of anger and empty glory, but with courage and composure. Whoever acts insolently falls under suspicion of those faults; but the one who endures, who is forced into the struggle and goes through the trial with gentleness, is not only admired as brave — his composure and consideration also make him no less praised. And this is what they did at that time, showing all courage and mildness, and doing nothing for pay, or for reward, or for any return: “‘Even if he is not willing to deliver us’ — for that is how it stands — ‘we will not serve your gods.’ For we already have our reward, in being counted worthy to be kept from all ungodliness, and for that end to give our bodies to be burned.”

We too, then, already have our reward — for we have it indeed, in having been counted worthy of the full knowledge of him, and counted worthy to be made members of Christ. So let us take care not to make them members of a prostitute. For we must close our discourse with this most fearful saying, so that, with the fear of the threat at its full strength, we may stay purer than gold, this fear helping to make us so. For in this way, delivered from all sexual immorality, we will be able to see Christ. May God grant us all to see him with boldness on that day, through the grace and love for humankind of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever. Amen.