The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: the First Epistle to the Corinthians
From these Fathers we gather, though some deny it, that the
excommunicate were formally handed over to the devil, and also corporally vexed and possessed by him, that they might learn to fear excommunication. Theodoret says this expressly here, and also at 1 Tim. iv. 20, and Ambrose too there says that this was the tradition of his forefathers, and that this is the strict meaning of “the destruction of the flesh.” Frequent examples of diabolic possession are to be found in the lives of the Fathers, and especially in the life of S. Ambrose by Paulinus. When Ambrose had delivered a certain man to Satan, the devil at that very moment seized him and began to tear him. For this reason Christ, in S. Matt. x., gave, S. Thomas says, to the Apostles power over unclean spirits, both to expel them from and to admit them into men's bodies to vex them. For other examples, cf. Delrio de Magia (lib. iii. p. i, qu. 7), Petr. Phyraeus (De Damon . p. ii. c. 30), Lerarius (in Tob . c. 6, qu. 20).
That the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus . That the soul and mind, gaining from this punishment wisdom and renewal, may be saved in the day of judgment. Hence it appears that the end of excommunication should be borne in mind, which is to cause the excommunicate shame and distress, that he may be humiliated, and ask to be received back, and seek for pardon from God and the Church. The faithful, therefore, should pray secretly for him, and endeavour to win him back to unity.
Ver. 6. — Your glorying is not good. Your boasting yourselves in your worldly wisdom, which makes you say, “I am of Paul,” “I of Apollos,” is evil and out of place. It were better for you to cast down the eyes of your mind, since you allow so great a wickedness to exist among you. So Anselm ; Theophylact adds from Chrysostom: “He implies obscurely and in a homely way that the Corinthians themselves prevented this fornicator from coming to a better mind, by glorying in his name ; for he was one of their wise teachers.”
A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump . As yeast penetrates every part of a mass of dough with its taste and sharpness, so does this one taint of the fornicator penetrate and stain all of you: firstly, because for the sake of one man the wrath of God may be kindled against you all, and against the whole Church which suffers him, as Ambrose and Anselm say ; and secondly, if this man go unpunished , others may follow his example, and this one may cause many to stumble. So S. Chrysostom. In other words, remove this scandal, and separate the man from the Church by excommunicating him.
Ver. 7. — Purge out , therefore , the old leaven. Eject this fornicator from your society, lest like leaven he infect the whole. It follows that not the predestinate alone, or hidden sinners, but that public sinners, like this fornicator, are in the Church till they are excommunicated. So Chrysostom. Although the Apostle refers primarily to the incest of the fornicator, yet Chrysostom and Anselm understand leaven more generally to be fornication, and its concealment, and any kind of wickedness and vice, which by parity of reasoning the Apostle orders to be removed from the soul of every individual and from the whole Church.
That ye may be a new lump . That your Church may be once more pure.
As ye are unleavened As Chrysostom and Anselm say, as by baptism you were made unleavened, i.e., pure from the leaven of sin, so consequently you are, or ought to be, from thenceforth unleavened, or pure and holy, by calling and profession. It is usual to say that what ought to be is ; and Christians accordingly are frequently called Saints, because they ought to be. Others take ye are strictly to mean that, excepting the one incestuous person, they were all unleavened or pure.
This unleavenedness of heart and life is put before each one at baptism, both in words and ceremonies, by the Church, when, after signing the head with the sacred Chrism, she clothes the newly baptized person with a white robe, and, holding out a lighted candle, says to him : “ Receive this holy and spotless white robe, and may you keep it without spot till you take it before the tribunal of our Lord Jesus Christ, and may you gain eternal life and live for ever and ever. Amen.” Or as S. Jerome has it in his letter to Damasus : “ Receive this burning and blameless light, guard well thy baptism, keep God’s commandments, that when the Lord cometh to the wedding thou mayest meet Him, together with all His Saints, in the court of heaven ; and mayest thou gain eternal life and live for ever and ever. Amen.” By the white robe and the lighted candle are signified (i.) a pure and exemplary life and conversation; (2.) freedom from the power of sin and the devil; (3.) victory and triumph over them ; for the Romans used to give their servants a white robe when they set them free, white being the colour of triumph. Of this garment S. Ambrose (Lib. de His qui Initial, c. 7), addressing the newly baptized, says: “You have received white garments for a testimony that you have cast away the slough of sins, and put on the holy garb of innocence.” Paulinus thus sings of the same thing : —
“ Thence from the sacred font the priest their father brings The infants, snowy-white in body, heart, and dress.”
Cf. also S. Augustine, Lactantius, and Victor of Utica, whose words I quoted on Rom. vi. 4.
Hence the Saturday and Sunday immediately after Easter Day are called Sabbatum in albis and Dominica in albis , because the neophytes then used to lay aside their white garments. Yet, as Baronius has rightly pointed out (a.d. 58, p. 606), they received a white Agnus Dei as it was called, made of paschal wax, and blessed by the Bishop, and wore it hung from their neck, that they might be ever reminded of purity and innocence, and might learn from Christ, the Paschal Lamb, to be thenceforth in every work unleavened, pure, meek, and lowly of heart.
For even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. The word for denotes : I rightly adjure you to be unleavened and pure, because you are keeping the Passover, in which the Jews had no leavened thing. As the Passover was a type of Christ, so were the unleavened loaves a type of the baptismal innocence and pure life of Christians. The Apostle’s argument is based on the allegorical meaning of the Passover and the unleavened bread.
The word Passover has its rise from the passing over of the angel of the houses of the Israelites when he saw the blood of the lamb that had been sacrificed for the purpose smeared on the doorposts. Then by a happy metonymy the lamb sacrificed is called the Passover , or the Passover victim, the victim slain for the passing over of the angel. Then, too, the day itself and the feast at which this happened, and its annual memorial are called the Passover.
Allegorically this lamb signified Christ. Our Passover, i.e., our Paschal Lamb, Christ, was sacrificed for us, that as many as are washed with the Blood of His Passion in baptism and the other Sacraments may be defended in safety from the destroying angel, who passes over them, and lights upon the unbelieving and the wicked, who have not been washed with the blood of Christ, to kill them with eternal death. For Christ has rescued those that have been so washed from Pharaoh’s yoke, that is, from the yoke of the devil and of sin, and having set them perfectly free He has loaded them with all gifts and graces, and daily is adding more.
S. Bernard ( Serm . i in die Pasch.) thus moralises on this passage : “Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed. Let us embrace those virtues commended to us by His Cross — humility, patience , obedience , and charity. On this great festival let us carefully consider what it is that is commended to us. It is a resurrection, a passover, a transmigration . For Christ, my brethren, did not to-day fall again but rose again: He did not return, He passed over: He transmigrated — did not go back . The very feast that we are celebrating is called the Passover, not “the returning;” and Galilee, where He who rose promises to show Himself to us, does not speak of going back but of transmigration. . . . We have lately given up ourselves to mourning, to penitence, and prayer — to heaviness and fasting. If we have bewailed our negligences, why should we now return to them ? Shall we as before be again found inquisitive, as fond of talking as before, slothful and negligent as before, vain, suspicious, backbiters, wrathful, and again involved in all the other vices which we but lately were grieving over? I have washed my feet: how shall I again defile them ? Alas ! the resurrection of the Saviour is made the time for sinning, the place in which to fall. Revellings and drunkenness return, chambering and wantonness are sought after, as though it was for this that Christ rose, and not for our justification. This is not a passing over, but a going back. For this cause, as the Apostle says, many are weak and sickly and many sleep. Therefore is it that in different places are there so many deaths, specially now.” S. Anselm, on i Cor. xi. 30, makes the same observation, viz., that at Easter diseases walk abroad and many die, because of so many making an unworthy communion, and either not making proper atonement for their sins, or else going back to them.