Not Commending Ourselves
12 Paul’s appeal to the consciences of his readers is not to be misunderstood. We are not commending ourselves to you again. Paul has already made this disclaimer (3:1; see the notes). He is in a difficult position, for though he has no intention of using any commendation beyond that of the Gospel itself, which authorizes those who preach it, it is necessary, or at least desirable, in the interests of the apostolic mission, that his good faith should be recognized by those who form the churches founded by him. The present verse is of great importance because it shows that this necessity arises out of the presence of others who work on different lines. Compare 3:2, and the development of the argument in chapters 10–13—the situation which in these four chapters flares up and is discussed with vehemence and some bitterness is already present in germ in the earlier part of the epistle. Allo writes of these verses: ‘The eagle is beginning to look down from above on the martins and foxes; but he is not yet ready to pounce down on them in vertical descent’. 1 Corinthians shows that the Corinthians could be troublesome enough on their own (though already outside influences were at work); the different situation (see the sketch in the Introduction, pp. 5–11) reflected by 2 Corinthians arises primarily out of the activities of a rival apostolate. But if Paul’s action is not self-commendation (but only, as Bultmann, Probleme, p. 14, points out, apparently self-commendation), what is it? We are giving (Paul uses a participle where a finite verb is called for, as at 7:5, 7; 8:19, 20, 24; 9:11; Rom. 5:11; cf. Moule, Idiom, p. 179) you an occasion of boasting on our behalf (that is, about us; cf. 1:14), in order that you may have something to set against (or, something to say to) those who boast in appearance, and not in heart (for the contrast between appearance and heart, πρόσωπον and καρδία, cf. Gal. 2:6; 1 Thess. 2:17). Paul is doubtless well aware that what he is doing must look very much like self-commendation; indeed it is self-commendation in the sense that he is representing himself as a faithful and trustworthy preacher of the true Gospel. More accurately, it is commendation of the Gospel as he himself represents it, for its motivation is to be found not in himself but in the Corinthian situation, in which others are boasting not sincerely and truthfully (in heart) but in matters that are external, and only apparently related to the truth. Who these persons were is a question that cannot be answered on the basis of this verse alone; evidence must be collected throughout the epistle. For a summary see ‘Paul’s Opponents’, and Introduction, pp. 28 ff. It is not unreasonable, in the light of verse 16, to suggest that part of their boasting rested upon contact with the historical Jesus (cf. Gal. 2:6), but we may add their commendation from official sources, their forceful characters, their visions,—and achievements that were not their own (see 10–13, passim). Boasting as such is not expedient (12:1), and Paul himself means to boast only in the Lord (10:17), but it was an important feature of the Corinthian situation that the Corinthian Christians, who at best were not too loyal to the apostle, should not be swept off their feet (as in the end they were—11:20) by his showy and plausible rivals. They needed an answer. The answer Paul provided—that in the fear of God he faithfully preached the Gospel entrusted to him, proclaiming Christ as Lord and himself as a slave (4:5)—does not seem to have been thought: adequate. Compare 11:6, 22 f.
Barrett, C. K. The Second Epistle to the Corinthians. London: Continuum, 1973. Print. Black’s New Testament Commentary.
Comments