(1) It is reported commonly.--Better, There is absolutely said to be fornication among you, and such fornication as is not even among the Gentiles. All the best MSS. omit the word "named." The force of the statement is that the fornication was of such a kind (with a stepmother) as even the Gentile world, immoral as it was, regarded with disgust, and how infinitely worse, then, was it to find such tolerated amongst Christians, whose moral standard ought to be much higher.

One should have his father's wife.--The word "have" here used always implies in the New Testament actual marriage. It is, therefore, probable that she had been divorced from his father. The word for "his father's wife" is the Hebrew form of expression for stepmother. St. Chrysostom suggests "he said not his 'stepmother,' but 'his father's wife,' so as to strike much more severely;" but probably St. Paul used the Hebrew phrase instead of the ordinary Greek word for "stepmother," as it was in this phraseology that such a union was forbidden by the law of Moses (Leviticus 18:8).

Verses 1-8. - Excommunication of an incestuous offender. Verse 1. - It is reported. The abruptness with which the subject is introduced shows the intensity of St. Paul's feelings, and his indignation that he should have been left to hear of this crime by common report. The news had come to him "from those of Chloe's household." But St. Paul was not acting on mere "report." The Greek phrase implies, "It is notorious that there is uncleanness among you." St. Paul must have felt it to be a bad feature in the character of the Corinthian Church that they had not mentioned this gross scandal in their letter. Commonly; rather, actually or absolutely; Elsewhere in the New Testament the worn only occurs in Matthew 5:24; 1 Corinthians 6:7; 1 Corinthians 15:29. Tertullian renders it "in totum." St. Paul has no need in this instance to name his informants. Every one knew of this scandal. Fornication; a general word for all kinds of impurity. And. The word involves an indignant climax, "Yes, and uncleanness of such a kind that," etc. Is not so much as named. The true reading is, does not even exist. This form of incest was, indeed, "named" among the Gentiles, for it forms the basis of the story of Hippolytus, the scene of which was in the neighbourhood of Corinth; but the feelings even of pagans were so shocked by it that Cicero alludes to such a crime in the words, "Oh, incredible wickedness, and except in this woman's case - unheard of in all experience!" ('Pro Cluent.,' 5). At this very epoch Nero deepened the general execration against himself by the generally accepted suspicion that he had been guilty of a yet more flagrant crime. Should have; rather, that a certain person has his father's wife. Apparently this was some nominal Christian, who was living in open sin with his stepmother, and thereby braving the curse of Leviticus 18:17; Deuteronomy 27:20. We gather from 2 Corinthians 7:12 that the father was living, and had also joined the Christian community. From the complete silence as to the crime of the woman, it must be inferred that she was a heathen. Whether she had been divorced or not does not appear, nor whether the offender was nominally married to her or not. His father's wife. He might have used the one Greek word for stepmother (μητρυιά), but the periphrasis might remind some of the heinousness of the sin, and of Leviticus 18:8.

5:1-8 The apostle notices a flagrant abuse, winked at by the Corinthians. Party spirit, and a false notion of Christian liberty, seem to have saved the offender from censure. Grievous indeed is it that crimes should sometimes be committed by professors of the gospel, of which even heathens would be ashamed. Spiritual pride and false doctrines tend to bring in, and to spread such scandals. How dreadful the effects of sin! The devil reigns where Christ does not. And a man is in his kingdom, and under his power, when not in Christ. The bad example of a man of influence is very mischievous; it spreads far and wide. Corrupt principles and examples, if not corrected, would hurt the whole church. Believers must have new hearts, and lead new lives. Their common conversation and religious deeds must be holy. So far is the sacrifice of Christ our Passover for us, from rendering personal and public holiness unnecessary, that it furnishes powerful reasons and motives for it. Without holiness we can neither live by faith in him, nor join in his ordinances with comfort and profit.It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you,.... The apostle having reproved the Corinthians for their schisms and divisions about their ministers, proceeds to charge them with immoralities committed among them, and which were connived at, and took no notice of by them; and particularly a very notorious one, which he here mentions with its aggravated circumstances. It was done among them; not only by one of their citizens, nor merely by one of their hearers, but by one of their members, and so was cognizable by them as a church; for though they had nothing to do with them that were without, yet they were concerned with them that were within: this was a public offence; it was known by everyone, and it was in everybody's mouth; it was heard in all companies; it was "commonly", "universally" talked of, and reported; it was generally known at Corinth, and in all Achaia, so that the church could not plead ignorance, nor could they be excused from blame in not as publicly declaring their abhorrence of the fact, as it was committed, which was fornication: fornication, "generally" taken, might be committed among them in all the branches of it, as that may include simple fornication, adultery, incest, and all acts of uncleanness; wherefore the apostle proceeds to describe that particular instance of fornication, that one of their members was guilty of:

and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife; not but that such unnatural copulations were practised, as among the Indians, Moors, Bactrians, Ethiopians, Medes, and Persians, as reported by sundry writers (y); and among the Arabians, before prohibited by Mahomet (z); but then such marriages and mixtures were not allowed of among the more civil and cultivated nations, as the Grecians and Romans, and never mentioned but with detestation and abhorrence: and if this man was a Jew, it was an aggravation of his sin, that he should be guilty of a crime decried by the Gentiles, as well as it was a violation of a known law of God given to the Jews, Leviticus 18:7 and, according to the Jewish writers (a), such a man was doubly guilty: their canon is,

"ba tva le abh he that lies with his father's wife is guilty, on account of her being his father's wife, and on account of her being another man's wife, whether in his father's life time, or after his death, and whether espoused or married;''

and such an one was to be stoned. Of this kind was this man's crime; he had his father's wife, not his own mother, but his stepmother; for there is a distinction between a mother and a father's wife, as in the above canon.

"These are to be stoned, he that lies with his mother, or with his father's wife.''

Whether this man had married his father's wife, or kept her as his concubine, continuing in an incestuous cohabitation with her, is not certain, and whether his father was dead or living; which latter seems to be the case from 2 Corinthians 7:12 his iniquity was abominable and intolerable, and by no means to be winked at in church of Christ.

(y) Alex. ab Alex. Genial. Dier. l. 1. c. 24. Curtius, l. 8. c. 2. Philo, de special. leg. p. 77. 8. Tertul. Apolog. c. 9. Min. Foelix, p. 34. Clement. Alex. Paedagog. p. 109. Origen. contr. Cels. l. 6. p. 331. Hieron. adv. Jovin. l. 2. fol. 26. (z) Koran, c. 4. Vid. Pocock. spec, Arab. Hist p. 337, 338. (a) Misn. Sanhedrin, c. 7. sect. 4.