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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comRobertson Word Pictures - 1 Corinthians 4:8 - 4:8
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Already are ye filled? (ēdē kekoresmenoi estė). Perfect passive indicative, state of completion, of korennumi, old Greek verb to satiate, to satisfy. The only other example in N.T. is Act 27:38 which see. Paul may refer to Deu 31:20; Deu 32:15. But it is keen irony, even sarcasm. Westcott and Hort make it a question and the rest of the sentence also.
Already ye are become rich (ēdē eploutēsate). Note change to ingressive aorist indicative of plouteō, old verb to be rich (cf. 2Co 8:9). “The aorists, used instead of perfects, imply indecent haste” (Lightfoot). “They have got a private millennium of their own” (Robertson & Plummer) with all the blessings of the Messianic Kingdom (Luk 22:29.; 1Th 2:12; 2Ti 2:12).
Ye have reigned without us (chōris hēmōn ebasileusate). Withering sarcasm. Ye became kings without our company. Some think that Paul as in 1Co 3:21 is purposely employing Stoic phraseology though with his own meanings. If so, it is hardly consciously done. Paul was certainly familiar with much of the literature of his time, but it did not shape his ideas.
I would that ye did reign (kai ophelon ge ebasileusate). More exactly, “And would at least that ye had come to reign (or become kings).” It is an unfulfilled wish about the past expressed by ophelon and the aorist indicative instead of ei gar and the aorist indicative (the ancient idiom). See Robertson, Grammar, p. 1003, for the construction with particle ophelon (an unaugmented second aorist form).
That we also might reign with you (hina kai hēmeis humin sunbasileusōmen). Ironical contrast to chōris hēmōn ebasileusate, just before. Associative instrumental case of humin after suṅ.