2 Corinthians 6: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Paul urges the Corinthians not to let God's grace come to nothing, and says the time of favor and the day of salvation are now. He then lists the hardships he and his coworkers endure and the qualities they show, arguing that these prove they are true servants of God. He tells the Corinthians his heart is wide open to them and asks them to open theirs in return. The chapter ends with a call not to be yoked together with unbelievers, backed by a string of quotations about God living among his people and receiving those who come out and stay separate.

Claim by Claim

1. 6:1
   • The speakers are workers together with God.
   • The speakers beseech the hearers.
   • Their appeal is that the hearers not receive the grace of God in vain.
   • It is possible to receive the grace of God in vain.
2. 6:2
   • God says something, which is then quoted.
   • God says he heard the one addressed in an accepted time.
   • God says he helped the one addressed in the day of salvation.
   • The speaker declares that now is the accepted time.
   • The speaker declares that now is the day of salvation.
3. 6:3
   • The speakers give no cause for stumbling in anything.
   • Their purpose is that the ministry not be blamed.
4. 6:4
   • In everything the speakers commend themselves as ministers of God.
   • They commend themselves in much endurance.
   • They commend themselves in afflictions.
   • They commend themselves in hardships.
   • They commend themselves in distresses.
5. 6:5
   • They commend themselves in beatings.
   • They commend themselves in imprisonments.
   • They commend themselves in riots.
   • They commend themselves in labours.
   • They commend themselves in sleepless nights.
   • They commend themselves in fastings.
6. 6:6
   • They commend themselves by purity.
   • They commend themselves by knowledge.
   • They commend themselves by patience.
   • They commend themselves by kindness.
   • They commend themselves by the Holy Spirit.
   • They commend themselves by love without hypocrisy.
7. 6:7
   • They commend themselves by the word of truth.
   • They commend themselves by the power of God.
   • They commend themselves by the weapons of righteousness on the right hand and on the left.
8. 6:8
   • They pass through honour and dishonour.
   • They pass through evil report and good report.
   • They are regarded as deceivers.
   • They are truthful.
9. 6:9
   • They are regarded as unknown.
   • They are well known.
   • They are regarded as dying.
   • They are alive.
   • They are chastened.
   • They are not killed.
10. 6:10
    • They are regarded as sorrowful.
    • They always rejoice.
    • They are regarded as poor.
    • They make many rich.
    • They are regarded as having nothing.
    • They possess all things.
11. 6:11
    • The speaker addresses the Corinthians.
    • The speakers' mouth is open toward the Corinthians.
    • The speakers' heart is enlarged.
12. 6:12
    • The Corinthians are not restricted by the speakers.
    • The Corinthians are restricted in their own affections.
13. 6:13
    • The speaker asks for a recompense of the same kind.
    • The speaker says he is speaking as to his children.
    • The speaker tells the Corinthians to be enlarged also.
14. 6:14
    • The hearers are told not to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers.
    • The question is asked what fellowship righteousness has with unrighteousness.
    • The question is asked what communion light has with darkness.
15. 6:15
    • The question is asked what concord Christ has with Belial.
    • The question is asked what part a believer has with an unbeliever.
16. 6:16
    • The question is asked what agreement the temple of God has with idols.
    • The hearers are the temple of the living God.
    • God has said something, which is then quoted.
    • God says he will dwell in them.
    • God says he will walk in them.
    • God says he will be their God.
    • God says they shall be his people.
17. 6:17
    • Therefore the hearers are told to come out from among them.
    • The hearers are told to be separate.
    • The Lord says this.
    • The hearers are told not to touch the unclean thing.
    • God says he will receive them.
18. 6:18
    • God says he will be a Father to them.
    • God says they shall be his sons and daughters.
    • The Lord Almighty says this.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

6:1

"Workers together with him": the Greek says only "working together," without naming the partner. Most take it as working alongside God, as the rendering does, but it could also mean Paul and his colleagues working alongside the Corinthians. "In vain" means to no effect, so that the gift produces nothing.

6:2

Paul is quoting Isaiah 49:8. "Succoured" was ordinary English in 1611 for came to someone's aid; the word has since dropped out of use. "A time accepted" does not mean a time that is tolerable but the moment God chose to act favorably.

6:3

"Offence" in 1611 did not mean hurt feelings. The Greek word names something laid in a path that trips a walker up. "Ministry" means the work of serving, not an institution or a department.

6:4

"Approving ourselves" meant proving or commending ourselves, putting evidence on the table. "Patience" in the KJV usually translates a word meaning endurance, holding up under sustained pressure, rather than waiting calmly.

6:5

"Stripes" are lash marks, so the word means floggings; Paul lists his own in 2 Corinthians 11:24-25. "Tumults" are mob riots, of the kind described in Acts. "Watchings" are nights spent awake, and "fastings" here most likely means involuntary hunger, going without food because there was none, rather than religious fasting.

6:6

"Longsuffering" means slow to anger under provocation, putting up with people for a long time. "Ghost" in 1611 simply meant spirit, with none of its modern associations, so "Holy Ghost" and "Holy Spirit" are the same phrase. "Unfeigned" means not faked; to feign is to pretend.

6:7

"Armour" here translates a word for weapons in general, not just protective gear. The right hand and the left is a soldier's picture: sword in the right hand, shield in the left, so attack and defense together, equipped on every side.

6:8

Honor and shame were the main currency of social standing in the Roman world, publicly awarded and publicly withdrawn. To be spoken of badly was not just unpleasant; it damaged a person's standing and ability to be heard.

6:9

"Chastened" means disciplined by punishment, the way a parent corrects a child, not merely scolded. The phrasing echoes Psalm 118:18, "The Lord hath chastened me sore: but he hath not given me over unto death."

6:11

Two idioms sit side by side. An open mouth means speaking with complete frankness, holding nothing back. An enlarged heart is a compliment in this language, not a medical condition: it means affection with room in it for others.

6:12

The KJV "bowels" translates a Greek word for the inner organs, which ancient writers treated as the seat of deep feeling, roughly where modern English says "heart." "Straitened" means made narrow or cramped, from the older sense of "strait" as a narrow passage, as in a strait of water.

6:13

"Recompence in the same" is a phrase from trade, meaning a return of like for like, a fair exchange. Paul founded this congregation, which is why he can speak to them as a parent to children.

6:14

A yoke is the wooden bar that harnesses two animals side by side to pull a plow. If the pair are mismatched in size or gait, the work goes badly and both animals suffer. Jewish law forbade plowing with an ox and a donkey together (Deuteronomy 22:10). "Fellowship" and "communion" here both mean having a share in something jointly, as business partners do.

6:15

Belial comes from a Hebrew word meaning worthlessness or ruin; the Hebrew scriptures call a scoundrel a "son of Belial." By Paul's time, Jewish writings had turned it into a proper name for Satan. Both senses stand behind the word here. "Infidel" in 1611 meant simply a person who does not believe, without the hostile edge the word later picked up.

6:16

A temple was understood as the house a god actually lived in, which is why an idol and the God of Israel could not share one. Corinth was crowded with such temples, so this was a daily question for the readers, not a theoretical one. "Ye are the temple" is plural throughout: the congregation together is the building, not each individual separately. The quotation combines Leviticus 26:11-12 with Ezekiel 37:27.

6:17

Quoted from Isaiah 52:11, words addressed to exiles leaving Babylon and carrying the temple vessels home. "Unclean" is a ritual category rather than a statement about dirt or morality: it describes what disqualified a person or object from approaching worship until the disqualification was dealt with.

6:18

This draws on 2 Samuel 7:14, God's promise to the heir of David, with "and daughters" added so that the promise covers the whole congregation. "Lord Almighty" renders the Greek term used for the Hebrew "Lord of hosts," the Lord who commands armies.