INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

toyouaι does not mean that he was coming a third time, but that this was the third time he was in readiness to come, τρίτον ετοίμως εχω. Upon the whole, the matter is sufficiently certain; nor do I propose it as a new interpretation of the text which contains the difficulty, for the same was given by Grotius long ago; but I thought it the clearest way of explaining the subject, to describe the manner in which the difficulty, the solution, and the proofs of that solution successively presented themselves to my inquiries. Now, in historical researches, a reconciled inconsistency becomes a positive argument: First, because an impostor generally guards against the appearance of inconsistency; and, secondly, because, when apparent inconsistencies are found, it is seldom that any thing but truth renders them capable of reconciliation. The existence of the difficulty proves the want or absence of that caution which usually accompanies the consciousness of fraud; and the solution proves that it is not the collusion of fortuitous propositions which we have to deal with, but that a thread of truth winds through the whole, which preserves every circumstance in its place.

SECTION XII.

Chap. x. 14-16. "We are come as far as to you also in preaching the gospel of Christ; not boasting of things without our measure, that is, of other men's labours; but having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by you according to our rule abundantly, to preach the gospel in the regions beyond you."

This quotation affords an indirect, and therefore unsuspicious, but at the same time a distinct. and indubitable recognition of the truth and exactness of the history. I consider it to be implied, by the words of the quotation, that Corinth was the extremity of St. Paul's travels hitherto. He expresses to the Corinthians his hope that in some future visit he might "preach the gospel to the regions beyond them;" which imports that he had not hitherto proceeded "beyond them," but that Corinth was as yet the farthest point or boundary of his travels. Now, how is St. Paul's first journey into Europe, which was the only one he had taken before the writing of the epistle, traced out in the history? Sailing from Asia, he landed at Philippi; from Philippi, traversing the eastern coast of the peninsula, he passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia to Thessalonica; from thence through Berea to Athens, and from Abens to Corinth, where he stopped; and from whence, after a residence of a year and a half, he sailed back into Syria. So that Corinth was the last place which he visited in the peninsula; was the place from which he returned into Asia; and was, as such, the boundary and limit of his progress. He could not have said the same thing, viz. "I hope hereafter to visit the regions beyond you," in an epistle to the Philippians, or in an epistle to the Thessalonians, inasmuch as he must be deemed to have already visited the regions beyond them, having proceeded from those cities to other parts of Greece. But from Corinth he returned home; every part therefore beyond that city might properly be said, as it is said in the passage before us, to be unvisited. Yet is this propriety the spontaneous effect of truth, and produced without meditation or design.

For St. Paul's journies, the reader is referred to the map which accompanies the Acts of the Apostles.

Dr. Lightfoot, in his Chronology of the New Testament, has made some good observations on the date of this epistle, and the circumstances by which that date is ascertained; collating, as Dr. Paley has done, the epistle with those parts of the history in the Acts, which refer to it. The following is the substance of what he says on this subject:

and

A new year being now entered, and Paul intending for Syria, as soon as the spring was a little up, he sends Titus beforehand to Corinth, to hasten their collections for the saints in Judea, that they might be ready against Paul should come thither. And with Titus he sends two other brethren; and by them all, he sends the second Epistle to the Corinthians. The proof that it was written and sent at this time, and in this manner, is plain, by these places passages in it. Chap. ix. 2, 3, 4: "I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia: yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain; lest haply they of Macedonia come with me," &c. Chap. xii. 14: "Behold, the third time I am coming to you." Chap. xiii. 1: "This is the third time I am coming to you." And, chap. viii. 16: "But thanks be unto God, who put the same earnest care into the heart of Titus for you." Ver. 17: "Being more forward, of his own accord he went unto you." Ver. 18: "And with him we have sent the brother, whose praise is in the gospel." Ver. 22: "And we have sent with them our brother, whom we have oftentimes proved diligent in many things," &c.

INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

The apostle, in this second Epistle to Corinth, first excuses his not coming to them, according as he had promised in his first Epistle, 1 Cor. xvi. 5, clearing himself from all lightness in making, and from all unfaithfulness in breaking, that promise; and fixing the principal reason upon themselves and their present condition; because he had not yet intelligence, when he went first into Macedonia, of any reformation among them of those enormities that he had reproved in his first epistle; therefore he was unwilling to come to them in heaviness, and with a scourge. This, his failing to come according to his promise, had opened the mouths of several in his disgrace, and false teachers took any other occasion to vilify him, which he copiously satisfies, and vindicates himself all along in the epistle. His exceeding zealous plainness with them, and dealing so home and thoroughly against their misdemeanors as he did, was one advantage that his enemies took to open their mouths against him, and to withdraw the hearts of the Corinthians from him; and chiefly because he was so urgent against the works of the law as to justification, and those rites which the Jews, even the most of those that were converted to the gospel, too much doated on.

After he had sent away this epistle by Titus, Erastus, and Mark, if our conjecture fail not, and had given notice to the Corinthians of his speedy coming to them, and warning them to get their collections ready against he came, he provided for his journey into Syria, which he had intended so long: partly to visit the churches in these parts, and partly to bring up the collections he had got for the poor of Judea; of which he had promised to the three ministers of the circumcision, Peter, James, and John, that he would be careful, Gal. ii. 10.

Acts xx. 4: "And there accompanied him into Asia, Sopater of Berea; and of the Thessalonians, Aristarchus and Secundus; and Gaius of Derbe, and Timotheus; and of Asia, Tychicus and Trophimus." Ver. 5: "These going before tarried for us at Troas." Ver. 6: "And we sailed away from Philippi, after the days of unleavened bread."

But when Paul, and this his company, are all going for Asia together, why should they not set out together; but these go before, and tarry at Troas, and Paul and some other of his company come after? Nay, they were all to meet at Troas, as it appeareth, ver. 6. Why might they not then have gone altogether to Troas?

The reason of this was, because Paul himself was to go by Corinth; and not minding to stay there but very little, because he hastened to Jerusalem, he would not take his whole train thither, but sends them off the next way they could go to Troas, himself promising and resolving to be speedily with them there. He had promised a long time to the church of Corinth to come unto them, and he had newly sent word in that epistle that he had lately sent, that now his coming would be speedy, 2 Cor. xii. 14: "Behold, the third time I am ready to come to you ;" and chap. xiii. 1: "This is the third time that I am coming to you." Not that he had been there twice before, for since his first departing thence (when he had staid a long time together, at his first planting of the gospel in that place) there is neither mention nor probability of his being there again; but this was the third time that he was coming, having promised and intended a journey thither once before, but was prevented, 2 Cor. i. 15, 16, 17. But now he not only promises by the epistle that he will come, but staketh the three brethren that he had sent thither for witnesses and sureties of that promise, 2 Cor. xiii. 1, 2, that in the mouth of these witnesses his promise might be established and assured. See the Introduction, sect. xi.

Now the time is come that he makes good his promise; and whilst the rest of his company go directly the next cut to Troas, he himself and Luke, and whom else he thought good to retain with him, go about by Corinth.

And now, to look a little further into the reason of their thus parting company, and of Paul's short stay at Corinth when he came there, we may take into our thoughts (besides how much he hastened to Jerusalem) the jealousy that he had, lest he should not find all things at Corinth so comfortable to himself, and so creditable to them, before those that should come with him, as he desired. He has many passages in the second epistle that he wrote to them that glance that way; for though, as to the general, there was reformation wrought among them, upon the receiving his first epistle, and thereupon he speaks very excellent things of them; yet were there not a few that thought basely of him, 2 Cor. x. 12, and traduced him and his doctrine, chap. xi. and xii., and gave him cause to suspect that his boasting of that church to the churches of Macedonia might come off but indifferently, if the Macedonians should come with him to see how all things were there, 2 Cor. ix. 4. And therefore it was but the good policy of just fear, grief, and prudence to send them by another way, and he had very just cause to stay but a little while when he came there.

Lightfoot's Works, Vol. I., page 310, &c.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EPISTLE

TO THE

CORINTHIANS.

IT is a general opinion among learned men that this epistle was written about a year after the former and this seems to be supported by the words, chap. ix. 2: Achaia was ready a year ago; for the apostle having given instructions for that collection, to which he refers in these words at the close of the preceding epistle, they would not have had the forwardness there mentioned till a year had elapsed. As the apostle had purposed to stay at Ephesus till Pentecost, 1 Cor. xvi. 8; and he staid some time in Asia after his purpose to leave Ephesus and go to Macedonia, Acts ix. 21, 22; and yet making here his apology for not wintering in Corinth, as he thought to do, 1 Cor. xvi. 6; this epistle must have been written after the winter, and consequently when a new year was begun. It therefore, says Dr. Whitby, seems to have been written after his second coming to Macedonia, mentioned Acts xx. 3. For, (1.) it was written after he had been at Troas, and had left that place to return to Macedonia: now that was at his second going thither; see chap. ii. 12. (2.) It was written when Timothy was with him: now, when he left Ephesus to go into Macedonia, Timothy went not with him, but was sent before him, Acts xix. 22; but at his second going through Macedonia, Timothy was with him, Acts xx. 4. (3.) He speaks of some Macedonians who were likely to accompany him, chap. ix. 4. Now, at his second going from Macedonia, there accompanied him Aristarchus, Secundus, and Gaius of Thessalonica, the metropolis of Macedonia, Acts xx. 4. (4.) The postscript says that this epistle was written from Philippi, where Paul was till the days of unleavened bread, Acts xx. 6; it therefore seems to have been sent from thence to them by Titus, and some other person, not long before St. Paul's coming to them; which he speaks of as instant, chap. xiii. 1; and that which he was now ready to do, chap. xii. 14; and did, according to Dr. Lightfoot, in his journey from Philippi to Troas; he sailing about from Philippi to Corinth, to make good his promise; whilst the rest that were with him, Acts xx. 4, went directly the next cut to Troas, and there waited for him. See Whitby.

That the first Epistle had produced powerful effects among the Corinthians is evident from what the apostle mentions in this. Titus had met him in Macedonia, and told him of the reformation produced by this epistle, see chap. vii. 5; that the church had excommunicated the incestuous man; that the epistle had overwhelmed them with great distress; had led them to a close examination of their conduct and state; and had filled them with respect and affection for their apostle, &c. Hearing this, St. Paul wrote this second epistle, to comfort, to commend them, and to complete the work which he had begun, by causing them to finish the contribution for the poor saints at Jerusalem; and also to vindicate his own apostolic character, and to unmask the pretended apostle, who had led them so long astray. See the preceding Introduction.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS.

Its principal divisions are

I.-The PREFACE, chap. i., ver. 1-7.

II.—The NARRATION, comprehending an account of what had happened to himself; his answer to their questions concerning the incestuous person, with different other matters; among which, the following are the chief:

(1.) The persecution which he had suffered in Asia, and from which he had been miraculously rescued, chap. i. 8-14.

(2.) His purpose to pay them a visit, chap. i. 15-24.

(3.) Concerning the sorrow which they had suffered on account of the excommunication of the incestuous person, chaps. ii. and vii.

(4.) His own vindication against the false apostle; in which he gives an account of his doctrine, chap. iii. 6-18. His conduct, chap. iv. 1-6. His bodily infirmities, chap. iv. 7; and chap. v.

(5.) Strongly exhorts them to a holy life, chap. vi. and vii.

III. Of the ALMS that had been collected, and were yet to be collected, chap. viii. and ix. IV. His DEFENCE against the false apostle and his calumniators in general, chaps. x.—xii. V. MISCELLANEOUS matters, chap. xiii.

It may be remarked, once for all, that none of these or such artificial divisions are made by the apostle himself, no more than the divisions into chapters and verses. All these are the work of man, and certainly contribute nothing to a proper understanding of the epistle itself. The apostle appears to have sat down, and, under the influence of the Divine Spirit, he wrote on the different subjects treated of in the epistle just in the order that these things occurred to his mind, without intending particular heads, divisions, or subdivisions. And, as he probably wrote the whole with very little intermission of time, his sense will be best apprehended by those who carefully read over the whole at one sitting.

THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PAUL THE APOSTLE

TO THE

CORINTHIANS.

Chronological Notes relative to this Epistle.

Year of the Constantinopolitan era of the world, or that used by the Emperors of the East in their diplomata, &c., and thence also called the "civil era of the Greeks,” føži (5565).-Year of the Alexandrian era of the world, or ecclesiastical epoch of the Greeks, ¿pv0' (5559).—Year of the Antiochian era of the world, toμơ (5549).—Year of the Eusebian epoch of the creation, or that used in the Chronicon of Eusebius, and the Roman martyrology, ò̟cπé (4285).-Year of the Julian period, 4767.-Year of the world, according to Bedford and Kennedy, in their Scripture Chronology, 4065.-Year of the Usherian era of the world, or that used in the English Bibles, 4061.-Year of the world, according to Scaliger, 4001. The difference of sixty years in the era of the world, as fixed by Scaliger and Usher, arises from the former chronologer placing the birth of Abraham in the 70th, and the latter in the 130th year of the life of his father Terah. For Scaliger's computation, see on Gen. xi. 26; and for Usher's computation, see on Gen. xi. 26, and xi. 32, conferred with Acts vii. 4-Year of the minor Jewish era of the world, 3817.-Year of the Greater Rabbinical era of the world, 4416.-Year since the Deluge, according to Archbishop Usher and the English Bible, 2405.-Year of the Cali Yuga, or Indian era of the Deluge, 3159.-Year of the era of Iphitus, who re-established the Olympic Games 338 years after their institution by Hercules, or about 884 years before the commencement of the Christian era, 997. -Year of the two hundred and ninth Olympiad, 1. This epoch commenced, according to the most accurate calculations of some of the moderns, precisely 776 years before the Christian era, and 23 years before the building of Rome; and computations of time by it ceased about A. D. 440.-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, who flourished about 225 years before Christ, and who is styled by Dionysius of Halicarnassus an accurate writer, 804. (This epoch is used by Diodorus Siculus.)-Year from the building of Rome, according to Polybius, the historian, 808.-Year from the building of Rome, according to Cato and the Fasti Consulares, and adopted by Solinus, Eusebius, Dionysius of Halicarnassus &c., 809.-Year from the building of Rome, according to Varro, which was that adopted by the Roman emperors in their proclamations, by Plutarch, Tacitus, Dio Cassius, Gellius, Censorinus, Onuphrius, Baronius, and by most modern chronologers, 810. N.B. Livy, Cicero, Pliny, and Velleius Paterculus, fluctuate between the Varronian and Catonian computations.-Year of the epoch of Nabonassar, king of Babylon, after the division of the Assyrian monarchy, or that used by Hipparchus, by Ptolemy in his astronomical observations, by Censorinus and others, 805. (The years of this era constantly contained 365 days, so that 1460 Julian were equal to 1461 Nabonassarean years. This epoch commenced on the IVth of the calends of March (Feb. 26), B. C. 747; and, consequently, the beginning of the 805th year of the era of Nabonassar coincided with the Vth of the Ides of August (Aug. 9), A. D. 57.-Year of the era of the Seleucidæ, or since Seleucus, one of the generals of Alexander the Great, took Babylon, and ascended the Asiatic throne, sometimes called the Grecian era, and the era of Principalities, in reference to the division of Alexander's empire, 369.-Year of the Cæsarean era of Antioch, 105.-Year of the Julian era, or year since the Calendar of Numa Pompilius, the second Roman king, was reformed by Julius Cæsar, 102.-Year of the Spanish era, or since the second division of the Roman provinces among the Triumviri, 95.-Year since the defeat of Pompey, by Julius Cæsar, at Pharsalia, called by Catrou and Rouillé the commencement of the Roman empire, 105.-Year of the Actiac, or Actian era, or proper epoch of the Roman empire, commencing with the defeat of Anthony by Augustus at Actium, 87.-Year from the birth of Jesus Christ, 61.-Year of the vulgar era of Christ's nativity, 57.-Year of the Dionysian Period, or Easter Cycle, 58.-Common Golden Number, or year of the Grecian or Metonic Cycle of nineteen years, 1, or the first common year. -Jewish Golden Number, or year of the Rabbinical Cycle of nineteen years, 17,or the sixth Embolismic. -Year of the Solar Cycle, 10.-Dominical Letter B; or, which is the same thing, the Calends of January (Jan. 1), happened on the Jewish sabbath, or our Saturday.-Jewish Passover (15th of Nisan, or Abib), Tuesday, April 5, or on the Nones of April.-Number of Direction, or number of days that