1 Corinthians 8:10Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

After saying, "Take heed, lest this authority of yours become a stumbling block" (1 Cor 8:9), he explains how and in what way this happens. He constantly points to weakness, so that they may not think the harm comes from the nature of the thing itself, and so that demons may not appear fearsome. Now, he says, your brother is close to completely abandoning idols. But when he sees that you gladly go to them, he takes this as guidance for himself and does the same. Thus the scandal comes not only from his weakness, but also from your lack of prudence. You make him still weaker.

That is: if someone weak sees you, who call yourself perfect, eating what has been sacrificed to idols, will he not find greater occasion to eat it himself? Will he not be even more confirmed, which is what "edified" means here, in the opinion that an idol is something? For, not knowing the thought with which you do this, he will certainly regard your action as an exhortation.

For if one of the brethren is unstable in his mind and sees you, who have knowledge, reclining there, then, with a false view of the sacrifice, he is carried away by desire to eat what has been sacrificed to idols...

Here he says that the weak man, seeing his experienced brother invited into a temple, reclining carelessly, and consuming as food the flesh sacrificed to idols, regards this as a kind of grace. He himself begins to eat what has been sacrificed to idols, not with the conscience and knowledge that there are no idols, but with the conscience that supposes there is some power of the idol in this. He thinks so when he sees his knowledgeable brother eating it without trembling.

The food of those who are being saved and of those who are perishing cannot be one and the same. Therefore we must not, after the example of the rich man’s son in the Gospel, live dissolutely and misuse the Father’s gifts (Lk 15:11-16). We must use them as masters should, without passionate attachment to them. For we have been appointed to command and rule over food, not to be its slaves.

If one of the simpler brethren sees you, a man of understanding, knowledge, and discernment, entering an idol’s temple and sitting at a table of idol-sacrifices, eating meats offered to idols, what then? Since he is weak, lacking your knowledge and not understanding why you do this, will he not cast every doubt from his conscience? Will he not dispose and confirm it toward eating idol-sacrifices and toward regarding idols as worthy of reverence? Although the Apostle presents this as a question, such a question has the force of an assertion.

If someone sees you, who have knowledge, sitting at table in a temple, will not his conscience, as that of one weak and infirm in will, dispose him to eat what is offered to idols? This may happen through imitation, or simply through an appetite aroused by desire. Yet he will still know that he is eating an idol-sacrifice and thereby defiling his conscience.

Having shown the unseemliness of eating things offered to idols in relation to the very author of this thoughtless act, the Apostle now shows its harmful effect on others. He means those who do not have a sound view of idols, who are not firm in devotion to Christianity, and generally the weak, who are scandalized by this ambiguous act of the self-styled wise.

He explains how the stumbling can occur. A brother, he says, will see you in the idol temple. He knows you as a man of much knowledge, honored by all, whose word and deed always carry weight among the brethren. Seeing you, he will be drawn by your example to sit likewise at a table of idol-offerings, although in his conscience he regards this as not sinless for a Christian.

Acting in this way, he will wound his conscience and sin before God, for one must never act against conscience. This is how the stumbling and fall of the weak brother can take place.

"And this scandal comes not only from his weakness, but also from your lack of understanding. You make him still weaker" (St. Chrysostom).

Nothing may be given to an idol, just as nothing may be taken from an idol. If it is contrary to faith to sit at table in a temple, what shall be said of a man clothed in the attire of an idol?