Homilies on First Corinthians — Homily 3

St. John Chrysostom

0. Greeting
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9

Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak of the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that you be perfected together in the same mind and in the same judgment.

What I have continually been saying, that we must frame our rebukes gently and gradually, this Paul does here also; in that, being about to enter upon a subject full of many dangers and enough to tear up the Church from her foundations he uses very mild language. His word is that he beseeches them, and beseeches them through Christ; as though not even he were sufficient alone to make this supplication, and to prevail.

But what is this, I beseech you through Christ? I take Christ to fight on my side, and to aid me, His injured and insulted Name. An awful way of speaking indeed! lest they should prove hard and shameless: for sin makes men restless. Wherefore if at once ( ἄν μὲν εὐθέως ἐπιπλήξης Savil. ἄν μὴ Ben.) you sharply rebuke you make a man fierce and impudent: but if you put him to shame, you bow down his neck, you check his confidence, you make him hang down his head. Which object being Paul's also, he is content for a while to beseech them through the Name of Christ. And what, of all things, is the object of his request?

That ye may all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions [schisms] among you. The emphatic force of the word schism, I mean the name itself, was a sufficient accusation. For it was not that they had become many parts, each entire within itself, but rather the One [Body which originally existed ] had perished. For had they been entire Churches, there might be many of them; but if they were divisions, then that first One had gone. For that which is entire within itself not only does not become many by division into many parts, but even the original One is lost. Such is the nature of divisions.