Beginnings
GenesisExodusLeviticusNumbersDeuteronomy
Judges
JoshuaJudgesRuth
Kingdoms
1 Samuel2 Samuel1 Kings2 Kings
Chronicles
1 Chronicles2 ChroniclesEzraNehemiahEsther
Poetry
JobPsalmsProverbsEcclesiastesSong of Solomon
Prophets
IsaiahJeremiahLamentationsEzekielDaniel
Minor Prophets
HoseaJoelAmosObadiahJonahMicah
NahumHabakkukZephaniahHaggaiZechariahMalachi
Messiah
MatthewMarkLukeJohnActs
Paul's Letters
Romans1 Corinthians2 CorinthiansGalatiansEphesiansPhilippiansColossians
1 Thessalonians2 Thessalonians1 Timothy2 TimothyTitusPhilemonHebrews
General Letters
James1 Peter2 Peter1 John
2 John3 JohnJude
Revelation
Revelation
Kept for this visit
Notes, starred verses and bookmarks kept while signed out last until this visit ends. Create a free account and everything you keep here moves into it, saved for good.
Create an account Sign in

Biblion Bible Commentary

Read the introduction to 1 Corinthians · About this commentary

The Parts We Think Less Honorable

1 Corinthians 12:21-26

21 The eye can’t tell the hand, “I have no need for you,” or again the head to the feet, “I have no need for you.” · WEB

The arrogant member is answered second, and God's own arrangement gives the greater honor to the parts nobody admires.

The eye can't tell the hand, "I have no need for you," or again the head to the feet, "I have no need for you" 1 Corinthians 12:21.

Now the complaint from above, and it is a different error. The foot had said I am not part of the body; the eye says I have no need for you. One doubts its own membership, the other doubts somebody else's usefulness — and in a church whose members were saying I follow Paul and suing each other 1 Corinthians 1:12 1 Corinthians 6:6, the second was the more damaging.

No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary 1 Corinthians 12:22.

And the reversal begins. Seem to be weaker — the weakness is in the appearance, and the reality is necessary. Anyone who has considered which organs a person can live without knows that the impressive ones are frequently not the essential ones.

Those parts of the body which we think to be less honorable, on those we bestow more abundant honor; and our unpresentable parts have more abundant modesty, while our presentable parts have no such need 1 Corinthians 12:23–24.

The observation is drawn from how people actually treat their own bodies, and it is done with tact. Nobody dresses a face; everybody clothes what is not for display. So the instinct to cover and protect the unpresentable is already a form of honor — human beings, without thinking about it, give the most careful treatment to the parts they show least.

But God composed the body together, giving more abundant honor to the inferior part, that there should be no division in the body 1 Corinthians 12:24–25.

Then the same principle is attributed to God's design rather than to human habit, and its purpose is named: that there should be no division. This is the letter's opening problem 1 Corinthians 1:10, answered here at the level of construction. A body in which the honor is deliberately weighted toward the unimpressive members cannot easily divide, because there is no stratum with an interest in separating. God's remedy for faction is a distribution of honor that runs against the direction status naturally flows.

When one member suffers, all the members suffer with it. When one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it 1 Corinthians 12:26.

The test of whether a group is a body, and it is involuntary in a real one — a person with an injured foot does not decide to be in pain. Both halves are searching, and the second is harder. Suffering with the afflicted is difficult; rejoicing when another member is honored requires that the honor not be experienced as a loss, which is exactly what a congregation competing over gifts could not do. That is why the next chapter has to be written 1 Corinthians 13:4.

settled What this mark means