Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
1 Corinthians 10:1-22, Israel in the desert and the table of demons
Paul warns that Israel too had its baptism and its spiritual food in the wilderness, yet fell into idolatry and immorality and was struck down, and tells the Corinthians that they cannot share both the Lord's table and the table of demons.
1 Corinthians 10:1-22, in every translation this tool compares.
Paul warns the Corinthians from Israel's history: the wilderness generation had their own baptism in the sea and their own spiritual food and drink, with Christ present among them, yet most died because of idolatry, immorality and grumbling. Those stories stand as warnings, so believers must run from idolatry. Sharing the Lord's cup and bread joins them to Christ, and since pagan sacrifices go to demons, they cannot share the Lord's meal and the demons' meal at once.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/food-offered-to-idols\/","n":"Meat offered to idols","s":"Most meat in a Greek city had passed through a sacrifice at a temple. Eating it at the temple's table, buying it in the market or meeting it at a friend's dinner raised the question of whether a believer was sharing in the worship of the god.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/pagan-gods-and-idols\/","n":"Many gods and their images","s":"The Greek and Roman world was full of gods, each with temples, statues, priests and local stories. Jews and Christians called the images things made with hands, while holding that there were real powers behind them.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/passover-pilgrims\/","n":"Passover and the pilgrim crowds","s":"The spring festival that retold God's rescue of Israel from Egypt. Jerusalem filled with pilgrims, and hopes of freedom ran high.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/eating-together\/","n":"Eating together","s":"Sharing a table made a bond of friendship, so who you ate with told everyone whose side you were on.","r":""}
Jewish people awaited a new exodus in the Messiah's time, and some traditions had the well follow Israel through the wilderness (Keener and his notes). Verse 8 recalls Baal Peor (Numbers 25); Josephus retells it, the young men "supposing there were many gods, and resolving that they would sacrifice to them according to the laws of that country which ordained them, they both were delighted with their strange food." Carson, Moo and Morris think some Corinthians treated baptism and the Lord's Supper as almost magical guarantees of life (10:1-5). Eating together made a bond, and sacrificial meat was tied to the god it was offered to (the cultural backgrounds notes). The Greek Old Testament calls false gods demons (Deuteronomy 32:17; Psalm 96:5), as most early Jewish and Christian sources do (Keener and his notes; Arnold). Heiser writes, "For Paul the pagan gods were demons", and Arnold notes that Paul uses the word four times in two verses and treats demons as the real recipients of the sacrifice, so a temple meal was fellowship with them.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on 1 Corinthians 10:1-2, 10:3-4, 10:7, 10:16-17 and 10:19-20
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on 1 Corinthians 10:4, 10:7, 10:8, 10:16, 10:18 and 10:20
- Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 4.6.8-9, trans. William Whiston
- Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm, ch. 38, Choosing Sides
- D. A. Carson, Douglas J. Moo and Leon Morris, An Introduction to the New Testament, ch. 9, 1 and 2 Corinthians, The Character of Paul's Opponents in 1 and 2 Corinthians
- Clinton E. Arnold, Powers of Darkness, ch. 4, Demons and False Gods, and ch. 6, They Are Involved in the World Religions
