Homily 25 — First Corinthians 10, verse 25, to 11, verse 1

“Eat whatever is sold in the meat market, asking no questions for conscience’ sake.” [a]

He had said that “they cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons,” and he had led them away from those tables once for all: by examples from the Jews, by human reasoning, by the awe-inspiring mysteries, and by the rites performed among the idols. He had filled them with great fear. But he did not want this fear to drive them to the other extreme, so that they would be forced into more scrupulousness than was needed and live in alarm that some such food might find its way in without their knowing it, from the market or from somewhere else. So, to release them from this tight spot, he says, “Eat whatever is sold in the meat market, asking no questions.” “For if you eat in ignorance and not knowingly,” he says, “you are not liable to punishment. From then on it is a matter not of greed, but of ignorance.”

Nor does he free them from this anxiety only, but from another as well, settling them in complete ease and freedom. For he does not even let them “ask questions” — that is, search and inquire whether a thing is an idol sacrifice or not. They are simply to eat everything that comes from the market, without even finding out what it is that is set before them. So even the one who eats, if he eats in ignorance, may be rid of anxiety. For such is the nature of things that are not evil in their essence, but make a person unclean through his intention. That is why he says, “asking no questions.”

Verse 26: “For the earth belongs to the Lord, and all that fills it.” Not to the demons. Now if the earth and its fruits and its animals are all his, nothing is unclean. It becomes unclean in another way: from our intention and our disobedience. That is why he not only gave permission, but also says, verse 27: “If one of those who do not believe invites you to a meal, and you want to go, eat whatever is set before you, asking no questions for conscience’ sake.”

See his moderation again. He did not command them or make a law that they should stay away; yet neither did he forbid it. And again, if they do go, he frees them from all suspicion. Now what might be the reason for this? So that such great scrupulousness would not seem to come from fear and cowardice. For the one who makes scrupulous inquiry does it because he is afraid; but the one who hears the fact and then abstains, abstains out of contempt and hatred and disgust. That is why Paul, wanting to establish both points, says, “Eat whatever is set before you.”

Verse 28: “But if anyone says to you, ‘This has been offered in sacrifice to idols,’ do not eat it, for the sake of the one who pointed it out.”

So it is not at all because these things have any power, but because they are accursed, that he tells them to keep away from them. Do not flee from them, then, as though they could harm you, for they have no strength. But do not partake of them carelessly either, just because they have no strength, for it is the table of beings who are hostile and degraded. That is why he said, “Do not eat, for the sake of the one who pointed it out, and for conscience’ sake. For the earth is the Lord’s, and all that fills it.” Do you see how he brings forward the same testimony both when he tells them to eat and when they must abstain? He says: “I do not forbid it for this reason, as though these things belonged to someone else — ‘for the earth is the Lord’s’ — but for the reason I mentioned: for conscience’ sake, that is, so that conscience may not be harmed.” Ought one, then, to make careful inquiry? “No,” he says, “for I did not say your conscience, but his. I have already said, ‘for the sake of the one who pointed it out.’” And again, verse 29: “Conscience, I say, not your own, but the other person’s.”

But perhaps someone will say: “You spare the brothers and sisters, as is natural, and you do not let us taste these things for their sake, so that their weak conscience will not be emboldened to eat the idol sacrifices. But if it is some pagan, what is this man to you? Was it not your own word, ‘What have I to do with judging those outside?’ (First Corinthians 5, verse 12). Why, then, do you turn around and care about them?” He replies: “My care is not for him. In this case too it is for you.” That is why he adds, “For why is my liberty judged by another’s conscience?” By “liberty” he means what is left free of any caution or prohibition. For this is liberty: being freed from the Jewish bondage. What he means is this: “God has made me free and beyond all reach of harm. But the pagan does not know how to judge my way of life, or to see into my Master’s generosity. He will condemn me and say to himself, ‘Christianity is a fable. They keep away from the idols, they shun demons, and yet they cling to the things offered to them. How great their gluttony is!’” Someone may say: “And what of it? What harm is it to us if he judges us unfairly?” But how much better to give him no ground for judging at all! For if you abstain, he will not even say this. [c]

You say: “How will he not say it? When he sees me not making these inquiries, either in the market or at the banquet, what is to stop him from speaking this way and condemning me as someone who eats without discrimination?” “It is not so at all. You partake of them not as idol sacrifices, but as clean food. And if you make no careful inquiry, it is to show that you are not afraid of what is set before you. This is the very reason why, whether you go into a pagan’s house or into the market, I do not let you ask questions: so that you will not become timid and anxious, and give yourself needless trouble.”

Verse 30: “If I partake by grace, why am I spoken evil of for that for which I give thanks?” “Tell me, of what do you ‘partake by grace’?” “Of the gifts of God. For his grace is so great that it keeps my soul unstained and above all pollution. The sun sends its rays down on many filthy places and draws them back again pure. In the same way, and much more, we who live in the midst of the world remain pure, if we choose to, by as much as the power we have is greater than the sun’s.” You say: “Why abstain, then?” “Not as though I would become unclean — far from it — but for my brother’s sake, so that I may not become a partner with demons, and so that I may not be judged by the unbeliever. For in this case it is no longer the nature of the thing that makes me unclean, but the disobedience and the friendship with demons. It is the purpose of the heart that produces the pollution.”

But what does “Why am I spoken evil of for that for which I give thanks?” mean? He says: “I, for my part, give thanks to God that he has set me so high, above the low condition of the Jews, that I am harmed from no quarter. But the pagans, not knowing my lofty way of life, will suspect the opposite. They will say, ‘Here are Christians with a taste for our customs! They are a kind of hypocrite: they abuse the demons and loathe them, yet they run to their tables. What could be more senseless than that? We conclude that they have taken up this teaching not for truth’s sake, but out of love of show and love of power.’ What folly would it be, then, if in the very things by which I have been helped so much that I even give solemn thanks for them, I should become the cause of evil speaking?” You say: “But the pagan will say these things even as it is, when he sees me not making inquiry.” Not at all. Not everything is full of idol sacrifices, so that he would suspect this; nor do you yourself taste them as idol sacrifices. So do not be overscrupulous. But on the other hand, when anyone says it is an idol sacrifice, do not partake. For Christ gave you grace and set you on high, above all harm from that quarter — not so that you would be spoken evil of, and not so that the very thing that has been such a gain to you, so great that it calls for special thanksgiving, would harm others so much as to make them even blaspheme. Someone asks: “But why don’t I say to the pagan, ‘I eat, I am not harmed at all, and I do not do this as a friend of the demons’?” Because you cannot persuade him, even if you say it ten thousand times, weak and hostile as he is. If your brother has not yet been persuaded by you, much less the enemy, the pagan. If your brother is gripped by his awareness of the idol sacrifice, much more the unbeliever. And besides, what need do we have of so much trouble?

“What, then? Since we have come to know Christ and give thanks, while they blaspheme, are we to give up this custom too?” Far from it! The thing is not the same. In that case our gain from bearing the reproach is great; in this one there will be no advantage at all. That is why he said earlier, “For neither if we eat are we the better, nor if we do not eat are we the worse” (First Corinthians 8, verse 8). And besides this, he showed that the thing was to be avoided in any case, so that they ought to keep away from these foods on other grounds too — not on this account only, but also for the other reasons he gave.

Verse 31: “So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything to the glory of God.” [f]

Do you see how, starting from the subject in front of him, he has carried his exhortation out to what is general? He has given us the most excellent of all aims: that God should be glorified in everything.

Verse 32: “Give no occasion for stumbling, whether to Jews, or to Greeks, or to the church of God.” That is, give no one a handle against you. For in the case supposed, your brother stumbles, the Jew will hate and condemn you all the more, and the pagan likewise will mock you as a glutton and a hypocrite.

Not only should the brothers and sisters receive no harm from us, however, but as far as we are able, not even those outside. For if we are “light” and “yeast” and “lights in the world” and “salt,” we ought to give light, not to darken; to bind together, not to loosen; to draw the unbelievers to ourselves, not to drive them away. Why, then, do you put to flight those you ought to draw to yourself? For even the pagans are harmed when they see us going back to such things, since they do not know our mind, or that our soul has risen above all the pollution that comes through the senses. And the Jews too, and the weaker brothers and sisters, will suffer the same harm.

Do you see how many reasons he has given why we ought to keep away from the idol sacrifices? Because they are unprofitable; because they are unnecessary; because of the harm to our brother; because of the evil speaking of the Jew; because of the abuse of the pagan; because we ought not to be partners with demons; because the thing is a kind of idolatry.

Further, he had said, “Give no occasion for stumbling,” and had made them answerable for the harm done both to the pagans and to the Jews, and the saying was a heavy one. See how he makes it welcome and light by putting himself forward. He says, verse 33: “Just as I also please all people in all things, not seeking my own good, but the good of the many, so that they may be saved.”

Chapter 11, verse 1: “Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ.” This is the rule of the most perfect Christianity; this is its boundary line, drawn with precision; this is the point that stands highest of all: seeking the things that serve the common good. Paul himself made this plain by adding, “just as I also am of Christ.” For nothing can make a person an imitator of Christ so much as caring for his neighbors. Even if you fast, even if you sleep on the ground, even if you strangle yourself, but give no thought to your neighbor, you have done nothing great. While you live that way, you still stand far from this likeness.

In the case before us, however, the thing itself is useful by its very nature: I mean keeping away from idol sacrifices. But he says: “I have done many things that were unprofitable as well: for instance, when I practiced circumcision, when I offered sacrifice. Examined in themselves, these things rather destroy those who follow after them and make them fall from salvation. Nevertheless, I submitted even to these because of the advantage that came from them. But here there is nothing of the kind. In that case, unless some benefit results and unless they are done for others’ sake, the thing becomes harmful. But in this case, even if no one is made to stumble, one ought still to keep away from the forbidden things.”

“And I have submitted not only to harmful things, but to toilsome ones as well.” For he says, “I robbed other churches, taking wages from them (Second Corinthians 11, verse 8); and when I had the right to eat and not to work, I did not seek this, but chose to die of hunger rather than make another stumble.” That is why he says, “I please all people in all things.” “Though it is against the law, though it is laborious and dangerous, whatever has to be done, I endure it all for the good of others.” So, being above all in perfection, he went beneath all in stooping down to them.

For no virtuous act can be very exalted if it does not share its benefit with others as well. The man who kept his one talent safe shows this: he was cut in pieces because he had not made more of it. So you too, brother: even if you go without food, even if you sleep on the ground, even if you eat ashes and wail without end, but do good to no one else, you will do no great work. [k]

For those great and noble men of the beginning made this their chief concern too. Examine their lives carefully, and you will see clearly that none of them ever looked to his own things, but each to the things of his neighbor; and that is why they shone the brighter. Moses, for example — to mention him first — worked many great wonders and signs. But nothing made him so great as that blessed cry he uttered to God: “If you will forgive their sin, forgive it; but if not, blot me out too” (Exodus 32, verse 32). David was like this too. That is why he said, “I, the shepherd, have sinned, and I have done wrong; but these, the flock, what have they done? Let your hand be on me and on my father’s house” (Second Samuel 24, verse 17). Abraham likewise sought not his own good, but the good of many. That is why he both exposed himself to dangers and pleaded with God for people who did not belong to him at all.

These men, then, became glorious in this way. But as for those who sought their own, consider what harm they suffered as well. The nephew of the man I just mentioned, for instance, listened to the words, “If you will go to the right, I will go to the left” (Genesis 13, verse 9). He accepted the choice and sought his own advantage — and did not even find his own. His region was burned up, while the other stayed untouched. Jonah, again, seeking not the good of many but his own, was in danger even of perishing: the city stood firm, while he himself was tossed about and overwhelmed in the sea. But when he sought the good of many, then he found his own as well. So too Jacob among the flocks, not seeking his own gain, received great riches as his portion.

And Joseph also, seeking the good of his brothers, found his own. At any rate, when his father sent him (Genesis 37, verse 14), he did not say: “What is this? Have you not heard that over a vision and a few dreams they even tried to tear me to pieces? I was made to answer for my dreams, and I am punished for being loved by you. What will they not do, then, when they get me in the middle of them?” He said none of these things. He did not even think of them, but put the care of his brothers above everything. That is why he also enjoyed all the good things that followed, which made him famous and showed him to be glorious.

So also Moses — for nothing prevents us from mentioning him a second time and seeing how he overlooked his own things and sought the things of others — this Moses, I say, was living in a king’s court. But because he “considered the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt” (Hebrews 11, verse 26), he threw them all out of his hands and became a sharer in the sufferings of the Hebrews; and so far from being enslaved himself, he set them free from slavery as well.

These are great things, surely, and worthy of the life of angels. But Paul’s conduct far surpasses them. All the others left their own blessings behind and chose to share in the sufferings of others; but Paul did something much greater. It was not that he agreed to share in other people’s misfortunes; he chose to be in every extremity himself, so that others might enjoy good things. Now it is not the same thing for someone living in luxury to throw away his luxury and suffer hardship, as for someone to suffer hardship all alone so that others may live in safety and honor. In the first case, though it is a great thing to exchange prosperity for suffering for your neighbor’s sake, it still brings some comfort to have companions in the misfortune. But to agree to be alone in distress so that others may enjoy their good things — that belongs to a soul of far greater force, to Paul’s own spirit.

And not in this only, but by another and greater excellence too, he surpasses all those mentioned before. Abraham and all the rest exposed themselves to dangers in the present life, and all they were ready to accept was this one death, once for all. But Paul prayed (Romans 9, verse 3) that he might fall from the glory of the world to come for the sake of other people’s salvation.

I can mention a third point of superiority as well. What is it? Some of those men did plead for people who plotted against them; but it was for people whose guidance had been entrusted to them. It was as if someone stood up for a wild and lawless son — but still his son. Paul, on the other hand, wished to be accursed in place of people whose care had not been entrusted to him; for he was sent to the Gentiles. Do you see the greatness of his soul, and the loftiness of his spirit, rising above heaven itself? Strive to be like this man. But if you cannot, at least follow those who shone under the old covenant. For you will find your own good in this way, if you seek your neighbor’s. So when you feel reluctant to care for your brother, remember that you cannot be saved any other way, and at least for your own sake stand up for him and his interests.

What has been said is enough to convince you that there is no other way to secure our own benefit. But if you also want to assure yourself of it by examples from ordinary life, imagine a fire starting somewhere in a house. Some of the neighbors, with an eye to their own interest, refuse to face the danger. They shut themselves in and stay at home, afraid that someone may get in and steal some of their household goods. How great a punishment will they suffer? The fire will come on and burn up everything of theirs as well; and because they did not look to their neighbor’s good, they lose their own besides. For God, wanting to bind us all to one another, has laid such a necessity on things that the good of one neighbor is bound up with the good of the other. The whole world is made this way. [o]

So too on a ship: if a storm comes on and the helmsman sets aside the good of the many and seeks only his own, he will quickly sink both himself and them. We may say of each separate trade, too, that if it looked only to its own good, life could never stand — nor even the trade itself that seeks its own. That is why the farmer does not sow only as much grain as is enough for himself; otherwise he would long ago have starved both himself and everyone else. He seeks the good of the many. The soldier goes out to face dangers in the field, not to save himself, but also to keep his cities safe. And the merchant does not bring home only as much as is enough for himself alone, but enough for many others as well.

Now if anyone says: “Each man does this looking not to my interest, but to his own. He goes into all these things to gain money and glory and safety for himself, so in seeking my good he is seeking his own.” This is what I say too. I have long wanted to hear it from you, and I have built my whole discourse around it: to show that your neighbor seeks his own good precisely when he looks to yours. For people would not otherwise make up their minds to seek the good of their neighbors unless they were brought to it by this necessity. That is why God has joined things together in this way, and does not let people reach their own good unless they first travel through the good of others.

This, then, is natural to human beings: to pursue their neighbors’ advantage in this way. But we ought to be persuaded not by this reason, but by what pleases God. For without this it is not possible to be saved. Even if you practice the highest perfection in your conduct but neglect others who are perishing, you will gain no confidence before God. Where is this made plain? In what the blessed Paul declared: “For if I give away my goods to feed the poor, and give my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing” (First Corinthians 13, verse 3). Do you see how much Paul requires of us? And yet the one who gave away his goods to feed the poor was not seeking his own good, but his neighbor’s. But this alone is not enough, he says; he wants it done with sincerity and deep fellow feeling. For this is why God made it a law: to bring us into the bond of love. When, then, he demands so large a measure, and we do not give even the smaller one, what pardon will we deserve?

Someone says: “And how is it that God said to Lot through the angels, ‘Escape for your life’?” (Genesis 19, verse 17). Tell me when, and why. When the punishment had come near. Not when there was an opportunity for correcting them, but when they had been condemned and were incurably diseased, when old and young alike had rushed into the same passions, and from then on they had to be burned up — on that day when the thunderbolts were about to be hurled. And besides, this was not said about vice and virtue, but about the punishment God was inflicting. For what was he to do, tell me? Sit still and wait for the punishment, and be burned up without doing them any good at all? No, that would have been the height of folly.

I do not claim that one ought to bring punishment on oneself without discrimination and at random, apart from the will of God. But when a man lingers long in sin, then I urge you to push yourself forward and correct him: if you will, for your neighbor’s sake; but if not, at least for your own good. The first, it is true, is the better course; but if you have not yet reached that height, do it even for this reason. And let no one seek his own, so that he may find his own.

And remembering that neither voluntary poverty nor martyrdom nor anything else can testify in our favor unless we have the crowning virtue of love, let us guard this above all the rest, so that through it we may also obtain all the other blessings, both present and promised. May we all attain them, through the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.