THEOSISJohn Chrysostom
So that what was said would not be taken as law, the Apostle adds, "But even if you marry, you have not sinned" (1 Cor 7:28). Then he appeals to circumstances, to pressing necessity, to a constricted time, and to affliction. Marriage is accompanied by many difficulties. He points to them here, as also in the homily on continence. There he said, "The wife does not have authority over herself." Here he says, "You are joined." "And if a virgin marries, she has not sinned." He does not mean a virgin who has chosen virginity. Such a one sins if she enters marriage. If widows are condemned when they enter a second marriage after once resolving to remain in widowhood, then much more are virgins condemned. "But such will have afflictions in the flesh." Yet, you say, there is pleasure as well.
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See how Paul limits even this by the shortness of time. "The time," he says, "is already shortened" (1 Cor 7:29). That is, we have already been commanded to depart from here and prepare for the exodus, while you press inward. Even if marriage brought no afflictions, one ought still to strive toward the things to come. But if it is accompanied by afflictions, what need is there to lay a burden on oneself? What necessity is there to take on such a burden, which, once taken, must be borne as though it had not been taken? "So that those who have wives," he says, "should be as though they had none." After saying something about the future, he again turns to the present. The spiritual point is that one cares for the things of her husband, while the other cares for the things of God (1 Cor 7:34). The earthly point is this: "I want you to be without cares" (1 Cor 7:32). Yet even this he leaves to their will. Whoever points out what is worthy of choice and then again compels it seems not to trust his own words. Paul, by his very yielding, urges and inclines them all the more. "I say this," he says, "for your own profit, not to put a noose upon you, but that you may serve in good order and without distraction" (1 Cor 7:35). Let virgins hear that virginity is not defined by this alone. She who cares for worldly things is not a comely virgin. After saying, "There is a difference between the married woman and the virgin" (1 Cor 7:33), the Apostle explains wherein their difference consists. He sets the distinguishing mark of the virgin and the non-virgin not in marriage or continence, but in freedom from cares in one and many cares in the other. Cohabitation is not evil, but the hindrance to philosophy. Blessed Paul shows that everything human is only an apparition and passes like a shadow or a dream, because it has nothing true or firm in itself. Is it not childish to chase a shadow, boast in a dream, and cling to what vanishes in a moment? "For the form of this world is passing away," he says. When you have heard that it is passing away, why do you still seek the goods of the world? When you have heard that everything human is only an apparition without truth, why do you willingly subject yourself to deception? Why, when you reflect on the changeability and instability of present goods, do you not despise them? Why do you not direct your desire toward those goods that are constant, firm, enduring, and subject to no change?