2 Corinthians 6:4-10
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
4 [a]on the contrary, in everything we commend ourselves as ministers of God, through much endurance,[b] in afflictions, hardships, constraints,(A) 5 beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, vigils, fasts;(B) 6 [c]by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, in a holy spirit, in unfeigned love,(C) 7 in truthful speech, in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness at the right and at the left;(D) 8 through glory and dishonor, insult and praise. We are treated as deceivers and yet are truthful;[d] 9 as unrecognized and yet acknowledged; as dying and behold we live; as chastised and yet not put to death;(E) 10 as sorrowful yet always rejoicing; as poor yet enriching many; as having nothing and yet possessing all things.(F)
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- 6:4a This is the central assertion, the topic statement for the catalogue that follows. We commend ourselves: Paul’s self-commendation is ironical (with an eye on the charges mentioned in 2 Cor 3:1–3) and paradoxical (pointing mostly to experiences that would not normally be considered points of pride but are perceived as such by faith). Cf. also the self-commendation in 2 Cor 11:23–29. As ministers of God: the same Greek word, diakonos, means “minister” and “servant”; cf. 2 Cor 11:23, the central assertion in a similar context, and 1 Cor 3:5.
- 6:4b–5 Through much endurance: this phrase functions as a subtitle; it is followed by an enumeration of nine specific types of trials endured.
- 6:6–7a A list of virtuous qualities in two groups of four, the second fuller than the first.
- 6:8b–10 A series of seven rhetorically effective antitheses, contrasting negative external impressions with positive inner reality. Paul perceives his existence as a reflection of Jesus’ own and affirms an inner reversal that escapes outward observation. The final two members illustrate two distinct kinds of paradox or apparent contradiction that are characteristic of apostolic experience.
1 Corinthians 4:9-13
New American Bible (Revised Edition)
9 [a]For as I see it, God has exhibited us apostles as the last of all, like people sentenced to death, since we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and human beings alike.(A) 10 We are fools on Christ’s account, but you are wise in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are held in honor, but we in disrepute.(B) 11 To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty, we are poorly clad and roughly treated, we wander about homeless(C) 12 and we toil, working with our own hands. When ridiculed, we bless; when persecuted, we endure;(D) 13 when slandered, we respond gently. We have become like the world’s rubbish, the scum of all, to this very moment.
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- 4:9–13 A rhetorically effective catalogue of the circumstances of apostolic existence, in the course of which Paul ironically contrasts his own sufferings with the Corinthians’ illusion that they have passed beyond the folly of the passion and have already reached the condition of glory. His language echoes that of the beatitudes and woes, which assert a future reversal of present conditions. Their present sufferings (“to this very hour,” 11) place the apostles in the class of those to whom the beatitudes promise future relief (Mt 5:3–11; Lk 6:20–23); whereas the Corinthians’ image of themselves as “already” filled, rich, ruling (1 Cor 4:8), as wise, strong, and honored (1 Cor 4:10) places them paradoxically in the position of those whom the woes threaten with future undoing (Lk 6:24–26). They have lost sight of the fact that the reversal is predicted for the future.
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