1 CORINTHIANS CHAPTER 7
Instructions with Regard to Marriage. 1 Cor. 7, 1—40.
The propriety and the duty of marriage: V. 1. Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote unto me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman. V. 2. Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.
This chapter contains St. Paul's great lesson on the state of marriage, which must be compared with the various passages, especially in the Old Testament, where the holy estate of matrimony is described. In the present chapter it should be noted that its principles are true for all times, but that the special application which St. Paul makes refers to the circumstances as they were found in his days, especially in the congregation at Corinth.
This distinction is observed in the text in such a way that the principles of which St. Paul treats are introduced as the commands of the Lord, his special application for the case submitted to him as his judgment or advice. Compare verses 1, 26, and 29.
The occasion of the discussion was a question or inquiry which had been put to the apostle by the Corinthians: But concerning that about which you wrote, the matters submitted in your letter. The questions were apparently the following: Should a person be married or not? What about the specific duties of marriage? Is the dissolution of the marriage-tie permissible if the one party is a Gentile?
Paul's answer to the first question: It is right, morally befitting, honorable, praiseworthy (in the sense of "not to be condemned") for one, for a person, not to touch a woman. It is not to be inferred, as the false ascetics will have it, that even the mere physical touch of a woman's hand or skin will pollute a man, although under circumstances a handclasp, the slightest brushing against the skin of a woman, may become an unlawful caress and a pollution. St. Paul is here obviously speaking of true celibacy, based upon the gift of chastity in its strictest interpretation, and defending it against those who thought it inhuman.
As Luther says, "it behooved St. Paul not to leave those without consolation who preferred to live a celibate life." But he hurries to add: But on account of the sins of immorality let every one have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband (Compare the extensive discussion of this passage in "Of the Marriage of Priests." Concordia Triglotta, 363 ff.)
The situation in those days was much as it is to-day: the sins of profligacy, of libertinism, of every form of immorality were so prevalent that it truly demanded an unusual measure of the gift of chastity to remain pure in the midst of so many temptations. Then, as now, the only way to be successful in fleeing fornication was in seeking the chastity of marriage. He is speaking, of course, of a Christian marriage, in which a man has only one, his own, wife, and a woman has only one, her proper, husband.
St. Paul did not dream of an impossible sanctity, but he dealt with the situation as it actually existed, and he prescribed the remedy which the Lord had provided. For the marital relationship between husband and wife, although it cannot, on account of inherent sin, be an altogether pure and undefiled service of God, is yet no immorality in itself, since the natural inclination of the sexes is in this instance sanctified by God's institution, and married people have that consolation that God's grace in Christ covers whatever is still present of the old flesh in their intercourse.