2 Corinthians 6:14Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

If someone said to a son who dishonors his parents and gives himself to corrupt men: "What are you doing, child? You despise your father and prefer corrupt men devoted to every impiety. Do you not know how much better and nobler you are than they?" By such words he would better turn him away from communion with them than if he praised only the father.

If he said, "Do you not know how much better your father is than they?" he would accomplish nothing. But if, leaving the father aside, he points to the son's own superiority over them, saying, "Do you not know who you are and who they are? Why do you not consider your nobility and free birth, and their baseness? What have you in common with such thieves, adulterers, and robbers?" Then, as if giving him wings by such praises, he easily disposes him to leave their company.

He will not so readily accept the first exhortations, because praise of the father will already serve as an accusation. In this very case he appears to be insulting not only his father, but precisely such a father. Here he hears nothing like this.

Besides, who does not love praise? Therefore reproof itself, when joined with praise of the hearer, becomes easier to receive. It softens, raises the spirit, and makes one abhor company with wicked men.

Here not only this distinction is worthy of admiration, but also the fact that he devised something greater to awaken fear in them. First he conducts his speech through questions, as is usually done when one speaks of something known and evident to all.

Then he expands it with many and various names. He places before the hearers' eyes not one, not two, and not three, but many names of the things compared. On the one side, he depicts the height of the virtues. On the other, he depicts the utter baseness of vice. Through the great, even infinite, distance between them, he shows that the matter no longer requires any proof.

"What fellowship," he says, "has righteousness with lawlessness? What communion has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion has a believer with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols?" (2 Cor 6:15-16).

Here he makes the distinction not between himself and the unbelievers, but between the virtue and nobility of the Corinthians and the baseness of the unbelievers. As a father, seeing his son bound to corrupt men, says to him, "What fellowship is there between your nobility and their filth?" so also the Apostle says: you are righteousness itself, but they are lawlessness. What, then, do you have in common with them?

"What communion has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial?"

Wishing by every means to urge them to depart from unbelievers, he did not say, "What communion is there between those in the light and those who dwell in darkness?" Nor did he say, "between followers of Christ and children of Belial." Instead of persons, he set the very realities themselves: light and darkness. This expresses much more. He also set Christ and Belial, which means apostate. By this he made his speech more fearsome.

In a struggle between two enemies, it is impossible for both to be victors over each other. The victory of one necessarily brings the death of the opponent. So too in this civil war that occurs in a mixed life, the better array can triumph only by utterly destroying and annihilating the other.

For how will the pious army overcome evil when the wicked array of its opponents rises against it? If the better is to conquer, the opposite must necessarily be put to death. Thus virtue will triumph over evil when everything hostile to it, with the cooperation of reason, is brought to nothing.

For the good can live in me only when it is given life by the death of its adversary. But as long as we cling to both, holding one opponent with one hand and the other with the other, this will not be possible.

The difference between these two realms is immeasurable, and life in them is incomparable. It is not proper for Christians to put on a bestial harness that accords with no plan for the good life. It is not proper for them to drag an alien burden aimlessly, to wander pathlessly in darkness, and to submit to the dreadful and evil guidance of Satan.

This is not proper for them because of the extreme baseness of all this. Still more, it is not proper because they possess all that is better. They have the light yoke of Christ, which gives rest. They have the true path, leading to eternal life. They have a holy life, full of happiness and blessedness in communion with God, their Savior and Father.

It is therefore understandable that communion with paganism must be broken off. And so the Apostle exhorts the Corinthians in every way to leave communion with paganism. He promises that the prophets' promises about men drawing near to God and God dwelling in men will be fulfilled in them.

By speaking of the highest reward awaiting Christians, namely to live with the Lord as with a Father, the Apostle acts as the wisest pedagogue. Having exhausted various forms of persuasion for Christians to abide in holiness and withdraw from pagan uncleanness, he finally speaks of the reward awaiting them for the struggle.

According to Bishop Theophan's explanation, "the Apostle calls the pagans lawlessness because sin reigns in paganism. As they are born in sin, so they also live in it. Self-pleasing governs their whole life.

Believers are light because of the brightness of their vision, which embraces all that exists and happens, the beginningless and the endless, time and eternity. They know whence they come, why they are on earth, and what awaits them beyond the grave. Knowing all this, they live as those who walk by day.

The pagans, by contrast, know none of this, and they live as life happens. A dense darkness of ignorance covers them. This is what they are like. Why then, says the Apostle, should you thrust yourselves into one yoke with them?

The comparison is according to leaders. You are Christ's; they are Belial's. Christ the Lord is essentially Savior and the Giver of sure salvation. Belial is ruin, a crafty deceiver who in malice lures all into destruction by the bait of self-pleasing pleasures.

The believer nourishes confidence that the Savior will crown his course with a good end, making him worthy of unending blessedness in His kingdom. The unbeliever walks without hope and can promise himself nothing certain in this life, still less in the life to come. Why then should you become paired with him?"

The occasion for this admonition may have been the participation of some Corinthian believers in meals with meat sacrificed to idols. It may also have included other pagan customs of daily life. The Apostle's intention is to remove them completely from everything bearing the mark of paganism: "Come out from among them, and touch not their uncleanness."

In his mind, every such contact with pagans is the same as harnessing oneself into one yoke with them, to draw the same burden and walk the same path.

Chrysostom introduces the Apostle's intention in this turn of speech as follows. "Here the Apostle speaks to them as if saying: do not turn aside into their ways. Look at the distance between your nobility and their baseness. Such a comparison made his speech more persuasive and attractive to the Corinthians.

If someone said to a son who dishonors his parents and gives himself to corrupt men: 'What are you doing, child? You despise your father and prefer corrupt men sunk in lawlessness. Do you not know how much better and nobler you are than they?' In this way he would turn him away from communion with them better than if he praised only the father.

If he said, 'Do you not know how much better your father is than they?' he would do little or nothing. But when he passes over the father and sets the son above them, saying, 'Do you not know who you are and who they are? Why do you not consider your nobility and free birth, and their baseness? What have you in common with such thieves, adulterers, and robbers?' Then, as if giving him wings by these praises, he easily disposes him to leave their company.

He will not so readily accept the first exhortations. For the father will then serve such a son not for honor, but as an accusation that he dishonors his father, and such an honorable father. Here he hears nothing of the sort.

Besides, who does not love praise? Therefore reproof itself, when joined with praise of the hearer, becomes easier to receive. It softens him, raises his spirit, and makes him abhor company with wicked men.

Here not only this distinction is worthy of admiration, but also the fact that he depicts it so strongly to awaken fear in the Corinthians. First he conducts his speech through questions, as is usually done when one speaks about something known and evident to all.

Then he expands it with many and varied names. He places before the hearers' eyes not one, not two, not three, but many names of the things compared. On the one side, he depicts the height of virtue, that is, the faith of Christ. On the other, he depicts the utter baseness of vice, that is, paganism. By the great, even infinite, distance between them, he shows that the matter no longer requires any proof."