1 Corinthians 1:5Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

“Because you were enriched in everything.” Through whom? Again he says, “in Him.” And they were not simply enriched, but enriched in everything. Thus you have wealth, divine wealth, in everything, and through the Only-begotten. What an ineffable treasure! “In every word and every knowledge.” This is not outward word, but the word of God. There is understanding without word, and there is understanding with word. Many have understanding but do not have word, such as the unlearned and those unable to express clearly what they hold in their mind. But you, he says, are not such. You are able both to understand and to speak.

“For in Him (en auto) you were enriched in everything.” The expression “in Him” is again used instead of “through Him” (di’ autou). Since you have wealth, and divine wealth, and in everything, and through the Only-begotten Himself, how then, ungrateful ones, do you appoint men as teachers for yourselves? “In every word and every knowledge.” There is also word without understanding, when someone, for example, speaks empty things without any thought. There is also understanding without word, when someone thinks on lofty matters but cannot find words to express them. But you have both word and divine understanding, so that you are able both to think and to speak.

"That in everything you were enriched in Him." You yourselves can perceptibly acknowledge, Corinthians, that you have been enriched with every spiritual gift, and that God Himself has abundantly poured out His grace upon you.

Do you wish to know more clearly the indescribable richness of God's goodness? Call to mind that you have been enriched in every word and every understanding.

By "word" the Apostle here understands the word of the evangelical preaching. Therefore in these words he encloses God's special goodness to the Corinthians.

This means that, since the Corinthians remained firm in the grace they had received and received spiritual knowledge in the word of truth, God works grace in them.

Here are particular forms of spiritual gifts, for it is said: "To one is given through the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit" (1 Cor 12:8).

The Apostle often leaves the name of Christ, the Son, the Lord, in order to teach by this that one must not be named from anyone else, but from Him Who granted salvation.

He calls the preaching of Christ a "testimony," because those who preach bear witness, as he also writes to Timothy: "I charge you before God, Who gives life to the dead" (2 Tim 4:1 and 1 Tim 6:13).

So also the Lord said in the Holy Gospel: "This Gospel of the Kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world to all nations, as a testimony to them" (Mt 24:14).

By the "confirmation" of the Gospel he means the working of miraculous signs, because by them the truth of the preaching was proved.

“In every word and in all understanding,” en panti logo kai pase gnosei. Logos points to the scope of knowledge of Christian truths, while gnosis points to the understanding of them. In the Second Epistle (2 Cor 8:7), the Apostle also points to other gifts of grace in which the Church of Corinth abounded. Here, however, he intentionally speaks only of word and understanding against those who were carried away by the eloquence of their teachers and sought the wisdom of men.

In the opening words of his epistle, speaking both in his own person and in that of Sosthenes the brother, St. Paul gives to "the Church of God which is in Corinth" the usual "grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

First, he bears witness to his continual thanksgiving to God "for the grace of God given to the members of the Corinthian Church in Christ Jesus" (1 Cor 1:4), so that they "are not lacking in any gift."

Then he expresses the hope that the Lord will so "confirm them to the end, that they may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor 1:8). For "God is faithful, by Whom they were called into the fellowship of His Son" (1 Cor 1:9).

In giving thanks to God for granting grace to the Corinthians, the Apostle on the one hand praises them as those counted worthy of this greatest divine gift. On the other hand, in this very thing he lays the foundation for his further judgment concerning their condition.

From the great multitude of gracious gifts, the Apostle Paul first points to their enrichment with verbal and intellectual knowledge concerning all the subjects of Christ's teaching.

From this he then concludes that the Lord, having so enriched them, will not leave them without His gracious help in the future. Thus they may calmly await even the dread day of the Lord's judgment. But to deserve this, they must correct themselves.

"In everything you were enriched." Through whom? Again, through Him, that is, the Lord Jesus Christ. And you were not simply enriched, but in everything. Therefore you have wealth, and divine wealth, in everything, and through the Only-begotten. What an ineffable treasure (Chrysostom).

He presents the reason why he said that grace was given to them in Christ Jesus. If you are rich in everything spiritually, he says, then you are rich through Him.

Remember what you were, and look at what you have become. You had nothing of what you now possess. Yet as soon as you believed and cleaved to the Lord, see how you became rich in spirit.

Or the force of the thought falls on "in everything," and "that" refers to "I thank." I thank God for grace, that He enriched you in everything.