(2) I told you before, and foretell you . . .--Better, I have warned you before (referring, probably, to the threat of 1Corinthians 4:13-19, and implied in 2Corinthians 1:23). The chief objects of this rigour were to be those whom he had described previously as "having sinned beforehand" (see Note on 2Corinthians 12:21); but he adds that his work as judge will extend to all the rest of the offenders. What he has in view is obviously passing a sentence of the nature of an excommunication on the offenders, "delivering them to Satan" (1Corinthians 5:5; 1Timothy 1:20), with the assured confidence that that sentence would be followed by some sharp bodily suffering. In that case men would have, as he says in the next verse, a crucial test whether Christ was speaking in him, and learn that he whom they despised as infirm had a reserve-force of spiritual power, showing itself in supernatural effects even in the regions of man's natural life.

Verse 2. - I told you before; rather, I have told you before. As if I were present, the second time. The meaning seems to be, "You must understand this announcement as distinctly as if I were with you, and uttered it by word of mouth." And being absent now I write; rather, so now being absent. The verb "I write" is almost certainly an explanatory gloss. And to all other; rather, and to the rest, all of them. Namely, to those who, though they may not have fallen into gross sin, still rejected St. Paul's authority, and said that he was afraid to come in person. I will not spare (2 Corinthians 1:23; 2 Corinthians 4:19, 21).

13:1-6 Though it is God's gracious method to bear long with sinners, yet he will not bear always; at length he will come, and will not spare those who remain obstinate and impenitent. Christ at his crucifixion, appeared as only a weak and helpless man, but his resurrection and life showed his Divine power. So the apostles, how mean and contemptible soever they appeared to the world, yet, as instruments, they manifested the power of God. Let them prove their tempers, conduct, and experience, as gold is assayed or proved by the touchstone. If they could prove themselves not to be reprobates, not to be rejected of Christ, he trusted they would know that he was not a reprobate, not disowned by Christ. They ought to know if Christ Jesus was in them, by the influences, graces, and indwelling of his Spirit, by his kingdom set up in their hearts. Let us question our own souls; either we are true Christians, or we are deceivers. Unless Christ be in us by his Spirit, and power of his love, our faith is dead, and we are yet disapproved by our Judge.I told you before, and foretell you as if I were present a second time,.... He means, that he had in his former epistle faithfully told them of their evils, and admonished them for them; and now he sends to them a second time before his coming, and again admonishes them, as if he was upon the spot with them; so that they had, as before, three witnesses, also a first and second admonition; which, should they be without success, he must proceed further:

and being absent now, I write to them which heretofore have sinned; before he wrote his first epistle, of which he had information, and had faithfully reproved and admonished them; see 2 Corinthians 12:21.

And to all other; that might since be drawn into a compliance with sinful practices, through their example; or as the Arabic version renders it, "to the rest of the congregation"; who would be witnesses for him, and against them, that he had admonished them a first, and a second time: and by his present writing declares,

that if I come again; for, not knowing what might fall out to prevent him, though he was bent upon coming, and ready for it, nor what was the will of God about it, he does not choose to be positive in the matter; and therefore writes conditionally, and with a guard, and no doubt with a submission to the divine will:

I will not spare; this was the reason why as yet he had not been at Corinth, because he was willing to spare them; see 2 Corinthians 1:23 being loath to come to severities, if gentler methods would take effect; but now having used all proper means, he is at a point, aud determined not to spare, but to use his apostolical rod, or that power which the Lord had given him in an extraordinary way, as an extraordinary officer, to punish incorrigible offenders, in such manner as the incestuous person, and Hymenaeus and Philetus had been used by him.