6:1 “Grievance” translates a word that means “matter of contention, dispute, lawsuit.”67 Paul’s main charge in this passage is that believers who have legal disputes with fellow believers should settle those disputes before believers and not take them to the law court before unbelievers.

Paul does not specify clearly in this passage if he has one specific instance in mind or if he is responding to multiple cases. One hint that Paul might have a specific case in mind is that “one of you” could mean “a certain one of you.” But throughout the passage Paul directly addresses the church as a whole because the church is responsible. He refers to Christians and non-Christians in several ways (cf. table 2.4).

TABLE 2.4: Christians and Non-Christians in 1 Corinthians 6:1–11

It is unthinkable for Paul that Christians would take fellow Christians to court before non-Christians. One can better understand his reasoning when reading verses 1–11 in light of the historical-cultural context of Corinth:68

(1) The disputes Paul condemns regard civil law and not criminal law, because Paul calls them “a grievance” (v. 1), “trivial cases” (v. 2), “matters pertaining to this life” (v. 3), and “a dispute” (v. 5) and because they involve cheating and defrauding (vv. 7–8). In general, criminal law is for punishing people who commit crimes that harm society (e.g., in first-century Corinth this would include violent offenses, treason, and embezzlement), while civil law is for resolving private disputes about money and possessions (e.g., inheritance, business dealings, property). Usually, when one person sues another in a civil case, he or she wants the court to require the other person to give the plaintiff money or property as payment. God ordained the governing authorities to enforce criminal law (cf. Rom. 13:1–5; 1 Pet. 2:13–14). What Paul condemns throughout this passage is one believer’s taking another to civil court.

(2) In the context of first-century Roman society, those who took others to court had high social rank. One who was socially inferior could not sue his superior (e.g., slave vs. master, client vs. patron, citizen vs. magistrate), and it was scandalous for a brother to sue a brother (whether brothers by blood or brothers by adoption). Instead, a person sued his social equal or inferior. It is easy to imagine a rich Corinthian Christian taking advantage of a poorer one in this way because in 1 Corinthians 11:17–34 Paul rebukes the richer Christians for shaming the poorer ones (cf. James 2:6).

(3) Secular magistrates and jurists who handled first-century Roman civil litigation were notoriously corrupt. They accepted bribes and ruled in favor of friends and those with a higher social standing. Paul himself experienced this injustice: the governor Felix incarcerated Paul for two years because he was hoping Paul would bribe him (Acts 24:26–27). The whole judicial system favored the elite—those with the most power, influence, and wealth. The higher that one’s social status was, the higher his legal privilege. Paul thus uses a play on words when he calls secular magistrates “the unrighteous” (1 Cor. 6:1): they unjustly enforce the law and are wicked in God’s sight (cf. vv. 9–10).

(4) Civil litigation results in factionalism and rivalry, not unity. Opponents are bitter enemies. What often motivates civil litigation is not justice but retaliating one-upmanship—humiliating one’s adversary and proving oneself to be socially superior. Clients of a patron would be obligated to side with their patron if he was in a lawsuit, so if a patron who was a Christian with fellow church members as clients sued a fellow church member, his clients would feel obligated to side with him against that fellow church member. The problem would be even worse if a patron sued a fellow church member who was also a patron and if both patrons had clients in the church, because then the clients would feel obligated to side with their patron against the other patron and against that other patron’s clients.

6:2 Paul gives a reason for verse 1 by arguing from the greater to the lesser. For example, since Tom can pick up a 100-pound table, then he is strong enough to pick up a little plastic cup. Similarly, since Christians “will judge the world,” then (i.e., Paul draws an inference) Christians should be competent to judge relatively trivial cases between believers now.

Paul ended the previous section by asserting that Christians must judge fellow church members but not the world (5:9–13). Here he says that Christians will judge the world. So this must refer to judging alongside Christ at the final judgment (cf. Dan. 7:22; Matt. 19:28; Rev. 20:4).

6:3 Paul gives a second reason for verse 1 by again arguing from the greater to the lesser. Since Christians will judge matters pertaining to the next life, then Christians should be competent to judge matters pertaining to this life right now.

Paul’s logic is sufficiently clear, but it is not as transparent what “we are to judge angels” means. God has already judged fallen angels (2 Pet. 2:4; Jude 6), and he has prepared “the eternal fire . . . for the devil and his angels” (Matt. 25:41). This passage suggests that God’s people will judge fallen angels at the final judgment alongside Christ (similar to how they will judge the world in 1 Cor. 6:2).

6:4 Now Paul follows an inference of verses 2–3 that essentially restates the main charge of verse 1. Christians should not lay before unbelievers their relatively trivial legal cases about matters pertaining to this life.

“Those who have no standing” accurately translates the sense of a participle that more formally reads “those who are disdained” (cf. BDAG, s.v. ἐξουθενέω). Believers disdain the worldly values of unbelievers, so why would believers lay their legal cases against each other before people who have no standing in the church?

6:5–6 Verse 5a offers a reason for verse 4: taking a fellow believer to court before an unbeliever is shameful. Paul previously wrote that he was confronting the Corinthians not to shame them but to admonish them like a father would his dear children (4:14). Not this time: they should be ashamed for bringing lawsuits against each other. Paul uses extremely strong language in an honor/shame culture.69

The second sentence (6:5b–6) sarcastically expresses incredulity at bringing lawsuits before nonbelievers (v. 4) by alluding to the wisdom motif that recurs throughout 1:10–4:21 (esp. 1:18–2:16; 3:18–23; 4:6–13). He says in effect, “How is it possible that people who think they are so wise [cf. 3:18] do not have enough wisdom to handle a mere squabble in the church family between two brothers? Why is it that such wise people have to resort to taking the matter before unbelievers?”

6:7–8 Paul makes most of his arguments in this passage by asking piercing rhetorical questions, but he begins verse 7 with a direct rebuke. He basically says, “When you take a fellow believer to court with a civil lawsuit, your goal is to win. But whether you win or lose the case, the church always loses because the church did not settle the case. Instead of having civil lawsuits, it would be better for you to be defrauded, but instead you are greedily and spitefully defrauding others—and not just anybody but your own brothers!”

“You . . . wrong” translates the Greek word adikeō, which is related to the adjective adikos, translated in verses 1 and 9 as “the unrighteous.” The implication is that the Corinthians were acting like the unrighteous, even though God had already declared the Corinthians to be righteous (i.e., justified: dikaioō, v. 11).

6:9–10 Paul supports his main charge of verse 1 (which he restates in v. 4), and thus all of verses 1–8 as a whole, by warning the Corinthian believers70 in effect, “Do not think you can get away with an unrepentantly sinful lifestyle. You are acting like the unrighteous. Do not think you can live that way and still be a citizen of God’s kingdom. Unrepentantly sinful lifestyles do not characterize citizens of God’s kingdom.”71 This warning also encourages Christians who choose to “suffer wrong” and “be defrauded” rather than “wrong and defraud” (vv. 7–8).

This vice list is merely a sampling; it is not exhaustive. It includes four Greek terms that Paul does not mention in 5:9–11: (1) “adulterers”; (2, 3) “men who practice homosexuality”; and (4) “thieves.” In many cultural contexts today, the two most controversial terms are malakoi and arsenokoitai: “men who practice homosexuality.” The ESV (cf. NIV) explains its translation in a footnote: “The two Greek terms translated by this phrase refer to the passive and active partners in consensual homosexual acts.” Garland explicitly translates the two words “males who are [voluntarily] penetrated sexually by males” and “males who sexually penetrate males.”72

Malakoi means “soft” and figuratively refers to effeminate males. In this context it refers to men who take on the role of a woman in sexual intercourse by being penetrated rather than by penetrating.73

Arsenokoitai is a coarse compound word that Paul apparently coins: arsēn means male (BDAG), and koitē refers to a bed and figuratively means “engagement in sexual relations,” specifically “sexual intercourse” (BDAG). These two words appear next to each other twice in the Greek translation of the OT at the places in which the OT most clearly condemns sex between two males:

(1)  Leviticus 18:22

• LXX: kai meta arsenos ou koimēthēsē koitēn gynaikos, bdelygma gar estin.
• AT: “And with a male you must not lie for engagement in sexual intercourse as with a woman, for it is an abomination.”
• ESV: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman [implied: for engagement in sexual intercourse]; it is an abomination.”

(2)  Leviticus 20:13a

• LXX: kai hos an koimēthē meta arsenos koitēn gynaikos, bdelygma epoiēsan amphoteroi.
• AT: “And whoever lies with a male for engagement in sexual intercourse as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination.”
• ESV: “If a man lies with a male as with a woman [implied: for engagement in sexual intercourse], both of them have committed an abomination.”

Thus arsenokoitai—especially alongside malakoi—refers specifically to men who sexually penetrate other men.74

6:11 The first sentence supports verses 9–10 as a reminder that believers are not inherently better than unbelievers. The sins that characterize unbelievers formerly characterized those who are now believers. Those sinners in verses 9–10 are exactly who believers used to be—past tense. The only difference is that God has intervened: he “washed” them clean from their filthy lifestyles and forgave them; he “sanctified” them as God’s holy people (cf. comment on 1:2), who are the Holy Spirit’s temple (3:16–17); he “justified” them, legally declaring them to be righteous. God the Father has done this through Jesus (i.e., based on what Jesus accomplished) and through his Spirit (i.e., the Spirit applies what God planned and Jesus accomplished).

In this passage Paul follows the same pattern as that in 5:7–8 (cf. comments there): he tells the Corinthians how to behave (6:1–10) and then roots that behavior in what is already theologically true of believers (v. 11). To paraphrase as an implied exhortation: “You are washed, sanctified, and justified, so live like it. Become what you are! Be clean, not filthy. Be holy, not profane. Be righteous, not unrighteous.”