The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: the First Epistle to the Corinthians
Or one member be honoured. Or, as Ambrose takes it, “be glorified,” or, according to Ephrem, “ whether one member rejoice.” Salmeron, after St Chrysostom, beautifully says : “ He who loves possesses whatever is in the body , the Church : take away envy and what I have is thine.” S. Chrysostom says again: “If the eye suffer , all the member will grieve , all will cease to act : the feet will not go , the hands will not work, the belly will take no pleasure in its wonted food, although it is the eye only that is suffering . Why, O eye , do you trouble the belly? why chain the feet? why bind the hands? Because all are knit together by nature , and suffer together in a mysterious manner.”
Ver. 27. — Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular. The Latin version gives “members of the member.” This is explained (1.) by S. Thomas: “You are members of the principal member, viz., Christ, for Christ is the head of the Church; (2.) by S. Anselm, “You are members of Christ through the agency of another member, viz., Paul, by whom you were united to Christ, the head, and to the Church, the body.” But (3.) the Greek gives “members in part,” and this is the rendering of some Latin Fathers, or “members of each other.” S. Ambrose seems to understand it so. The Latin version also means “fellow-members,” brethren in the same society, of the same mystical body, the Church. So too S. Chrysostom and Ephrem, whose meaning may be paraphrased: “Each one, in his part and place, is a member of the Church.”
Notice here that, as in the body there is (1.) a unity and a union of soul and body ; (2.) diversity of members ; (3.) differences of function between the several members ; (4.) an aptitude for its function given to each member ; (5.) a community of interests in the members, so that each is bound to work, not for itself only but for the others also, just because they are members of the one body; (6.) harmony, inasmuch as each member is content with its rank and duty, does not seek another post or envy a more honoured member, so that there is the most perfect union and concord, the same share in sorrow and joy : so is it in the Church. There each one has from Christ, as if He were his soul, his proper gift, his proper talent, his office and rank, his functions to be discharged for others’ good, not his own, his limits fixed by God. If any one disturbs this order and seeks after another post, he resists the ordinance and providence of God, and forgets that all his gifts have come from God. S. Paul therefore says: “You, O Corinthians, are members of the same body of Christ, the Church : let there not be then any divisions among you, let no one despise, envy, or grieve at another, but let him love him, help him, and rejoice with him. Let each be content with his place, his rank, and his duty, for so he will be a partaker, not only of his own good, but also of the good of others. Just as the foot walks for the benefit of the eye, the ear, the belly, so in their turn the eye sees, the ear hears, and the belly digests for the benefit of the foot. But if there is envy and unwillingness shown by the eye to see, by the ear to hear, and the belly to digest, then those members hurt themselves as much as any other ; and, as Chrysostom says, it is just as if one hand were to cut off the other, for that hand would be dishonoured and weakened through receiving no help from the other hand. Moreover, if nature is at such pains to preserve such perfect concord between the different members of the body, and so sternly forbids any seditious discord, how much greater concord between men’s minds will the grace of God through its greater power effect, how little will it endure that any member should stand aloof from and be at variance with another in the same body ! If the magistrate or the king severely punishes sedition in the state, what, think you, will Christ do to the schismatics who rend His Church?
Ver. 28. — And God hath set some in the church, &c. Apostles as the rulers, prophets as the eyes, teachers as the tongue. From this it follows that the princes of this world are not, as Brentius thinks, the rulers and the head of the Church, but the Apostles and their successors , the Pope and the bishops ; “ for God,” says S. Paul, “ set the Apostles first.” After that come “powers,” i.e., workers of miracles, who are as the hands of the Church ; then healers of diseases ; then helps, or those who help others and perform works of mercy towards the sick, the poor, the unhappy, guests, and foreigners ; then governments , or men who rule and correct others, as parish priests, as S.
Thomas says, or better still, with Theophylact and Cajetan, men who have the care of the temporal wealth which the faithful offer to the Church. These last are as the feet in the body of Christ, and of such were the deacons ordained by the Apostles to look after tables and the widows (Acts vi. 1-6).
Notice the abstract here put for the concrete : “ powers ” for workers of powers, “gifts of healing” for healers, “helps” for helpers,
“governments” for governors, “diversities of tongues” for men skilled in different languages. S. Paul knits all these, as other members of the Church, to Apostles, prophets, and teachers.
Ver. 29. — Are all apostles? Certainly not. Let each, therefore, be content with the position in which God has placed him in the Church, and with the grace that he has freely received from God, and thank God for all, and use the grace given him to God’s glory and the good of the Church.
Ver. 30. — Have all the gifts of healing? S. Augustine says (Ep. 137) that “ God, who divides to every man severally as He will, has not willed that miracles should be wrought in honour of every saint.” It is not wonderful then that God should work miracles in this place, in this temple, at this or that image of the Holy Mother, or again that He should give one grace to one saint, another to another. Those, e.g., who invoke S. Antony He sets free from the plague, those who invoke S. Apollonia from toothache, those who invoke S. Barbara from sudden death, and from dying without confession ; for, as the Apostle says, “ God divides to every man severally as He will.” So at the pool of Bethesda, and not elsewhere, God miraculously healed the impotent folk (S. John v. 2-4). So by the rod of Aaron, and of no one else, He worked miracles (Num. xvii. 8). So by the image of the serpent, and of nothing else, He set free the Jews from the plague of fiery serpents (Num. xxi. 9).
Ver. 31. — But covet earnestly the best gifts. Seek from God, and exercise, if you have received them (cf. notes to ver. 8), the more useful gifts, such as apostleship, prophecy, wisdom, but not such as the gift of tongues, which you are in the habit of seeking after and of priding yourselves in. So Anselm. Others take the clause interrogatively , “Do you covet the best gifts? then I will show you a more excellent way still.” So Chrysostom, Theophylact, Œcumenius.
And yet show I unto you a more excellent way, viz., the way of charity, which is the way to God, to life, and everlasting glory.
The commentary ascribed to S. Jerome says here that the Apostle divides off charity from the gifts of the Spirit, because these latter are gratuitously given by God, but charity is acquired by our own efforts and natural powers. This shows this commentary not to be S. Jerome’s, but the work of Pelagius or some Pelagian, as was said before. Primasius, who transcribed a good deal of this commentary, has shown the falsity of this remark. It appears too that charity is the gift of God from Rom. v. 5 : “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.” Hence S. Paul says here that he shows a more excellent way, meaning one that excels all others. If, then, the graces gratuitously given are of lower rank and are given by God, much more ought charity, which is exceedingly better and more excellent than them all, to be sought for and to be given from God. The Apostle then fixes the distinction between charity and the gifts of the Spirit in the fact that these latter are given for the good of the Church, not for the sanctification of him to whom they are given, while charity is given to make him who has it holy and pleasing to God. “He,” says S. Augustine (de Laud. Char.), “holds both what is patent and what is latent in God's sayings who holds charity in his daily life.”